Four

There was a small house at the end of Julliard Drive that looked sound. The doors and windows were all sealed, and Daryl took the lead in searching the house. Lydia stayed at his side, and they went room to room looking for walkers. Thankfully, there were none, but there wasn't much else there, either. Whoever had lived there before had packed up and left in a hurry, probably during the first evacuations.

Daryl had managed to find a few cans of stew shoved in the back of a lower cupboard, so he'd sent Lydia to wash up while he cooked the stew in a pan over a small fire in the hearth.

He was crouched down, and his neck cracked when he turned his head to listen to the sound of the wind outside. His whole body ached, and he knew that once he settled in for the night, he was going to feel the brunt of every injury he'd had in the past few months. Most nights his head throbbed until he passed out from exhaustion. Tonight, however, he felt a little better than usual. Maybe it was because he had a solid lead on Rick.

Finding Rick would at least bring some sort of comfort. The man had been like a brother to him since high school. More of a brother to him than his own flesh and blood had been, anyway. Hell, Rick's own parents had been more of a mother and father to him than his own parents had. If it hadn't been for them taking him in with a newborn during his last year of high school, he wasn't sure where he would've ended up. He had always felt indebted to the Grimes', but they'd never made him feel bad for the financial strain he knew he and Lydia had put on them.

The stew began to bubble in the pot, so he took it off the fire and ladled it out into two bowls. He took a taste to make sure it was hot enough before putting the bowls on the coffee table. He grabbed a couple bottles of water from his pack, put those down by the bowls and then headed to the stairs. Just as he was starting up, he heard a muffled shriek. It was brief but noticeable, and he rushed up the steps as fast as he could.

"Lydia?" He knocked on the door. He could hear a stifled cry followed by a loud sniffle. "Hey. You ok?" He tried the knob, but the door was locked. "Lydia, are you ok?"

"I'm fine," she choked out. Moments later, she stepped out of the bathroom with a lit candle in one hand. Her eyes were filled with tears, and her damp hair was a tangled mess. She wiped her nose with the back of her hand, and Daryl narrowed his eyes at her.

"What happened?"

"Nothing, ok? Just…can we eat?"

"Yeah. Yeah, food's ready," Daryl offered gruffly, clearing his throat. Lydia hoisted her pack over her shoulder, brushed past Daryl and hurried down the steps. He stood there for a moment, trying to figure out what the hell just happened.

She was growing up, that was for certain. He'd always tried to stay one step ahead of the game. He'd read the baby books while studying for his SATs. He'd been the youngest single dad in the playgroups he'd taken her to. He'd dealt with all kinds of judgmental looks and comments over the years. He could still remember a woman clucking her tongue and shaking her head and harping on and on about how that pretty little girl deserved to have a mother.

Of course Lydia deserved a mother. But he'd done the best he could with her. Still, he knew there were some questions she was going to have that only a woman could answer, and he felt bad that she didn't have that.

Lydia was already eating when Daryl joined her on the couch. She didn't look at him when he sat down, and she blew over another spoonful before taking another bite.

"Good?" Daryl asked.

"Yeah." She took another bite.

"Anything you…wanna talk to me about?"

"No."

"Ok." Daryl nodded and took a bite of his stew. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Lydia shift uncomfortably on the cushion beside him. "You sure?" Lydia nodded again before clearing her throat.

"I thought something was…wrong. But then I remembered something I read in a book that time we stayed in that school." Daryl nodded slowly. "About…bleeding."

"Bleeding?" Daryl furrowed his brows for a moment. Lydia sighed heavily and crinkled her nose for a moment. "You're bleeding? Are you ok?" Lydia groaned and looked up at her dad for a moment, begging him to just understand already. When he stared back at her with equal parts worry and confusion, she sighed with all the theatrics of a typical teenager.

"I got my period."

"Oh." Daryl's spoon clattered a little too loudly in his bowl, and Lydia looked away in embarrassment. He couldn't tell if she was embarrassed about the situation or the fact that she had to practically spell it out for him. "Are you ok?"

"I'm fine," she muttered.

"Do you have any questions?" He inwardly cringed. How the hell was he supposed to give her answers to any questions she might have about her period? This was all uncharted territory. He was neck deep and sinking.

"I know what it means," Lydia muttered. "I just got scared. I guess I forgot it would happen." That was understandable. It wasn't like she had a mother to tell her about those things. It wasn't like she didn't have a lot more pressing issues to deal with day in and day out like finding food and shelter and staying alive.

"M'sorry I didn't talk to you about it before," Daryl said quietly. "Hell, I'm sorry you got scared."

"It's not your fault," Lydia said quietly, taking another bite of stew. "You're not the one that left me." Daryl stared at his daughter for a moment. She didn't mention her mother much. She rarely asked about her anymore, and Daryl knew she resented her. He hated that she carried that kind of anger around inside of her, but he understood. He'd carried it for a long time, too. Still, he'd tried to make sure she had a woman in her life to talk to, and Lori had been it for the longest time. Once she and Rick divorced, the visits became fewer, but she still made time for Lydia when she could.

"I should've had your Aunt Lori talk to you about it."

"She told me about sex last year," Lydia said with a shrug. The way she said it so casually had Daryl at a loss for words. He rubbed the back of his neck anxiously before opening and closing his mouth. He stumbled over his words and nearly choked. "She told me after a woman gets a period, she can have a baby. She told me how that stuff works. I guess I just didn't think about it happening to me." Lydia crinkled her nose. "The stuff I read in that book told me what I need to get. And there isn't any of it here. Can we try the pharmacy in the morning?"

"Yeah. Course we can."

"Ok," Lydia said with a nod.

"Ok." Daryl took a deep breath and took another bite of food. He cleared his throat again. "Maybe we'll stop by the library, see if we can find a couple books that might answer some questions I can't." Lydia thought for a moment before nodding. "Alright. Finish your stew before it gets cold."

...

Daryl lay on the couch rubbing his temples and staring up at the ceiling. Lydia lay on a cot close to the fireplace, and he could tell by her even breathing that she was fast asleep. He, however, was wide awake. The ache in his body begged for rest, but his mind was running a mile a minute.

He felt like he'd failed Lydia in some way. Here this poor kid was having to piece together memories of things she'd read and conversations she'd had with Lori over a year ago to get herself through something that he figured was probably monumental to her. He remembered back in junior high all the girls whispering and slipping things to each other in the hallway before heading to the bathroom. He never quite understood that until his older brother Merle crudely explained that that was what happened when girls were 'on the rag.'

Most of what he learned about girls came from Merle, so when he had his first sexual experience at sixteen, he hadn't quite been prepared for the repercussions of that. 'Make sure you wear a rubber.' That was the only piece of advice Merle had thrown his way. So, he'd used one. And it had broken. And it was as if every bad cliché in every bad chick flick he'd ever seen decided to come true. Four weeks later he got a call that changed his life forever.

He'd tried to do the right thing, even told her he'd get a job and pay for an abortion if that was what she wanted. But she didn't want that. She wanted to keep the baby, she wanted to give it the kind of life that she grew up with. She'd had two good parents and a big sister, and she hadn't ever wanted for much of anything. Daryl had no idea what that was like considering his dad was in and out of jail and his mom was in and out of rehab. But he supported her decision, even offered to marry her, which was met with a resounding 'absolutely not' from her father. They hadn't been supportive of the pregnancy at all, but Daryl had gotten a couple parttime after school jobs flipping burgers and washing cars to help out.

Life seemed to just speed past him at neck-breaking speeds. He hadn't ever even really had a girlfriend. He'd liked girls but never had the courage to say anything. And she had been the one to approach him. Leah. She was a pretty girl that he didn't even really know. They didn't have classes together. They didn't have mutual friends.

She'd been popular and pretty enough, so he hadn't really known what the hell she would see in a guy like him. And as time went on, he wondered if the reason she hadn't taken up with him wasn't because she was rebelling against her father.

She got good grades and had her heart set on going to school on the east coast, and when that pregnancy test turned positive, everything had been put on hold. Even though they'd only been on a couple of dates, Daryl felt like he had an instant family. And Leah hadn't told him any different. She told him she still wanted to go to school, but she'd probably just settle on a local school. She'd even been talking about moving him in with her parents despite their protests. Daryl just assumed that this was it. He'd make a mistake young, and now he had to pay the consequences. Did he love Leah? No. But he tried. He tried to make it work, because he wanted to prove to her dad that he wasn't worthless. He wanted to prove to her that he could be a good dad despite his own upbringing with a mostly absent father.

When Lydia was born, it felt like a cliché all over again. He never felt such an intense amount of love for something so fast. He could still remember crying when he held her in his arms for the first time. He couldn't get over her thick, dark hair or her impressively strong, tiny fingers that wrapped around his pinky.

He was seventeen and scared shitless when she came into the world. Leah had gone home with the baby to stay at her parents', and Daryl tried to be there every chance he could.

He could still remember the day Lydia asked him to meet her outside the school. She was sitting on a park bench with the diaper bag beside her and the baby sleeping in her stroller.

All he could really remember from the conversation they'd had was that she'd gotten into a really good school, one she didn't think she'd had a chance of getting into. She was going in the Fall, and she wasn't taking the baby with her. She couldn't be tied down. She had a future in mind, and he and the baby weren't part of it. She didn't want to be trapped, so she had to get out now.

The next few weeks went by in a blur. He'd brought the baby home, only for his parents to tell him if he was keeping it, he couldn't stay under their roof. So, he'd showed up at his best friend Rick's front door, and even though it shouldn't have surprised him, he still couldn't believe the feeling of being accepted and let in by the people who had never treated him like anything less than family.

Over the years, Daryl had wondered about Leah. He'd been so angry at first, her leaving like that. But as time went on, Leah signed away her rights, and Daryl settled into life as a single dad. And while sometimes he felt like a complete failure, other times he felt like he was doing something right. When Lydia would look up at him with such love in those pretty brown eyes, when she'd laugh at something silly he'd say or do, he felt more love than he ever thought possible.

And when Lydia began to ask about her mother, he would always tell her the same story. She knew that Lydia deserved a family that could give her everything she needed. While maybe he couldn't give her all the material things, he gave her everything she needed in love and encouragement. The story had worked until Lydia was maybe ten or so. Now she didn't ask about her mother as much, and she didn't have much to say when someone asked about her.

Daryl could still remember Lydia telling a schoolmate on Mother's Day that she didn't need a mom. She had the best dad in the world, and she didn't need anyone else.

He wondered if Leah was still alive, if she had made a happy life for herself after leaving Georgia. She never communicated, never asked for any kind of information on Lydia, and her own parents had packed up and moved out of state without so much as holding their granddaughter one last time. It was their loss, really. Lydia had turned out to be a pretty great kid.

After high school, he'd gotten a pretty decent job at a garage working on cars, and he also picked up some roofing jobs. He gained skills and notoriety and became the guy to call if anything needed fixed or built. He made enough money to live on his own, but he maintained close ties with Rick and his family so Lydia would have some idea of what an extended family was, even if it was just the two of them at home.

He was proud of the young woman she was turning out to be. As many nights as he'd laid awake wondering if he was doing the right thing in raising her, he knew without a doubt that nobody would have loved her as much as he would have. Maybe she would have had more growing up if someone else had taken her. But she never went hungry. She always had a roof over her head. And they learned how to be a family together. If Leah hadn't left, he didn't know where he'd be now. Would he even have his daughter in his life? He and Leah never would've worked. They were too different and wanted different things. Maybe she would've moved away and taken his daughter from him. He wasn't sure. All he knew was that shit happened the way it was always going to, and he'd protected his daughter this long. No way in hell was he going to stop.

...

Carol slid the camping lantern closer to the bathroom mirror and twisted to examine the dark bruise on the back of her shoulder. She'd hit that floor hard, and she was lucky that was all she'd come away with. That walker had been so close to biting her back at the department store.

She winced, turned around and slid a t-shirt over her head. She ran her fingers through her damp, auburn-brown hair. Her scalp was still sore from where the walker had grabbed her, and she gently brushed her fingers over the tender spot in soothing circles.

She'd thought about cutting it for a while, just because it was such a hassle to mess with being constantly on the go. But today's mishap in the store had sealed the deal for her.

Her hair was a bit tangled, but she managed to get it smoothed out before she took the scissors to it. She hadn't cut her own hair since college, but she certainly knew how to do it. When she and Ed had first gotten married and she was putting herself through college and then nursing school, she'd worked part-time at her aunt's salon in Peachtree City. She had only done simple cuts, but she'd racked up enough experience that she'd given Sophia a pretty cute style for picture days on occasion.

But, she wasn't here to impress anyone, so she took the shears to her curls right away, watching them fall in long, dark tresses into the sink. She'd always loved her hair, always been told how beautiful it was, and a year ago probably would have gotten emotional over such a drastic cut. But for now, it was necessary. Until she was stronger and more able to fend off walkers, she was going to do what she had to in order to protect herself and stay alive for her kids.

It took a little time, and by the time she finished, Henry was starting to fuss in the other room. She did a quick once over, looking for anything too terribly disproportionate. She'd cut it shorter than she'd ever cut it in her life. It was short, almost a pixie cut, though certainly rougher than she'd have gotten if the luxury of a salon still existed. Still, it was hair, and it would grow out if she chose to let it.

"Mom?" Henry's cries grew louder, and Sophia stepped into the doorway with him squalling in her arms. Her eyes went wide. "Your hair!" Carol chuckled to herself and put down the scissors. She turned to her daughter and reached out for the baby. "Why'd you cut it? Your hair was so pretty."

"Yeah, and a walker got their hands in it today. Almost took me out." She hadn't meant it to sound so harsh, but that was reality these days. Sophia flinched. "I was rushing. I didn't hear it, and it got me. I'm ok."

"You're sure?" Sophia asked, eyes wide and worried. Carol nodded, bouncing Henry in her arms.

"I'm sure." She ran a hand over her newly shorn locks. "Kind of feels funny."

"I like it," Sophia shrugged. "Hey, you could shave your head. That'd be kinda cool." Carol made a face at her daughter.

"Okay, now you're just making fun."

"Can I shave my head?" Sophia asked with a giggle. Carol thought for a moment, picked up the shears and took a step toward her.

"You were such a cute, bald baby. I can make it happen."

"No!" Sophia laughed. "I was joking!"

"I wasn't. Let's go!"

"Mom!" Sophia yelped, leaping back. Carol grinned and put the scissors down.

"Did you find anything in the kitchen?"

"Almost expired noodle soup."

"Good enough for me. Maybe we can round up some stale crackers." Carol followed Sophia into the living room and settled down on the couch to nurse Henry. She yawned and sunk back into the couch cushions, propping a pillow under Henry to support him a little.

Sophia brought two bowls with room-temperature soup over, and she set out a bottle of water by each bowl.

"You go ahead and eat," Carol urged her. "I'll eat when Henry's asleep." Noticing Sophia's hesitancy, she nodded to her. "I'm fine, Sophia. You eat." Sophia pushed her cold soup around the bowl with her spoon, and Carol looked down at Henry. "You kept him safe today. I know you were scared, but you did so good today, Sophia." She glanced back up at her. "You did everything you could, and we all got out alive. Don't worry about what happened or what could have happened. The only thing that matters is that we got out. Right?" Sophia nodded. "Talk to me."

"I'm scared," Sophia admitted. "I'm scared you're gonna die and leave me alone." Her eyes were brimming with tears now, and Carol reached over to squeeze Sophia's shoulder. "I feel like something bad's gonna happen, and you're gonna leave us alone." She looked at her baby brother and then at her mother. "I know you're teaching me things because you think you're gonna die." Carol shook her head.

"We're all going to die, Sophia. It's part of life. Moreso now than ever," Carol said quietly. "Every day is a fight, and I'm scared too. I don't want to leave you. I don't want to leave Henry. But I'll sleep better at night knowing that if something does happen to me, you'll be able to take care of yourself and your brother without me. I know you can. I'm so proud of you, Sophia." She brushed her hand over the back of Sophia's head. "I've been scared for you since the day I found out I was pregnant with you. That never stops. But that fear is why I dig in every day and make sure you know what you need to know to get through this world. We're learning together, and I don't plan on going anywhere anytime soon. Alright?" Sophia nodded, but the worry in her eyes gave her feelings away. "Hey. No matter what happens, I won't stop fighting. We don't give up, do we?" Sophia shook her head.

"No. We don't give up."

"That's my girl." Carol chuckled softly and nudged Sophia's arm. "Eat your food. Tomorrow's another long haul. You're gonna need your strength."