AN: Here we are, another chapter here.

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

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Daryl wanted Carol and Henry to have time. He wanted them to have the opportunity to talk, or to be quiet, or to do whatever it was that they needed to do to clear the air. Carol needed peace—and maybe Daryl needed it every bit as much as she did—and she wasn't going to get it until she and Henry had discussed everything and reached some kind of happy, common ground.

So, Daryl had done the only thing he'd known to do—he'd figured out how to make himself scarce.

He'd kept himself busy. Using a stirrup hoe, he'd cut the grass to keep snakes away from the house and to make it safe for them to be outside. While he'd worked on that, he'd walked the perimeter of their little lot and contemplated how he might extend the fences that surrounded the lot to swallow up more of the land around them. He considered simply fencing in what he wanted to add and then creating a gate so that the house was never unprotected.

That was a project for another day, though, because he would have to make arrangements for locating the necessary supplies.

The small storage shed out back, in addition to tools that Carol had put there like the stirrup hoe, held a few other things that the previous occupants of the house had left behind. Some outdoor chairs for good weather were stored out there, so Daryl dragged them out and wiped them down to rid them of spiders. He cleaned up the porch of the little house and tore down the old wasps' nests and spider webs, and then he put the chairs on the porch so that there was somewhere to sit.

It would come in handy, at least, when he wanted somewhere to smoke and watch Dog while he pissed on everything in the yard.

Lastly, Daryl shoveled the built up ashes out of their fire pit, made note that he would look for rocks to make a better pit, and then he settled down in one of the porch chairs to enjoy the fruits of his labor while giving Carol and Henry space.

He was just beginning to let his mind wander and to start thinking about the fact that, really, he hadn't given himself time to really think too much in the past few days, when he suddenly found himself not entirely alone—and it wasn't Dog's company that interrupted Daryl's solitude.

Henry didn't say anything at first. He stood by the door and stared at the chairs like they were potentially dangerous. Daryl watched him out of the corner of his eye and lit a cigarette.

"Where's your mom?" Daryl asked, forcing Henry to acknowledge that he could see him.

"She's taking a nap," Henry said.

Daryl laughed to himself, immediately struck by that information.

"For real, though, what's she doin'?" Daryl asked.

"She's taking a nap," Henry repeated.

Daryl took a drag on the cigarette. He tapped the chair next to his.

"You can sit in it, if you want," Daryl said. "It's clean. They seem pretty sturdy. Found 'em in that lil' shed."

Henry eased close to the chair like he had to sneak up on it and catch it before it ran away. It was a common, plastic, Adirondack chair. It stayed obediently in place until Henry finally took a chance and eased down to sit in it. Daryl let him settle a moment before he spoke to him again.

"Your Mom don't hardly sleep at night," Daryl said. "And she can't stand to even be off her feet during the day. She's too afraid she'll miss something these days. And before? In the beginning, she was too afraid that someone would find some fault with what the hell she was doing. Like if she sat down, the whole world would come to an end. Someone might die if she didn't serve 'em the moment they thought about needin' something. She don't nap."

"She does today," Henry offered. "She was yawning. I told her to take a nap. She said she thought she would and…she curled up on the couch. I covered her up with that blanket that was on the back of the couch."

Daryl sat there a moment and thought about it.

Maybe it was possible that Carol was taking a nap, after all. Maybe she was tired. Maybe the baby needed sleep or something and had its ways of forcing her into sleeping even though she normally wouldn't do that in the middle of the day.

Daryl knew very little about babies and, honestly, that worried him.

Of course, it was also possible that Carol was simply napping because Henry had asked her to nap. Maybe she was simply pretending for his benefit. She was that kind of mother—she was the kind of mother that would do just about anything for her child just to make them feel a little bit better.

Daryl did know a good mother when he saw one.

Daryl also had some understanding of teenage boys, especially those that had a particular hunger to have approval, affection, and stability. He might not have really found it, but he knew what it was to crave it.

"She's probably just tired," Daryl said, "from the trip and all. Been a—been a busy couple days. Lot goin' on."

"She's been worried," Henry said.

Daryl hummed.

"About the baby," Daryl said. "Yeah. I guess—it ain't no reason to keep it a secret from you. She's scared something's gonna happen to it. Like—she'll wake up in the morning and it just won't be there no more, I guess. To tell you the truth, I don't exactly how those things happen, but I do know they happen. She's just worried that…it'll happen."

"Because she lost her daughter," Henry offered. "Sophia."

"That," Daryl said. His stomach twisted a little as the memory of Sophia—stumbling out of the barn as a Walker—flashed before his eyes. The twisting intensified as he remembered her telling him about what had happened at a little house before she reached Terminus. "She's—had a hard time."

"Dad said she was scared of losing me," Henry said.

"She mighta been," Daryl said. He stared at Henry and took the final drag off his cigarette before he flicked the butt into the yard. "She got any reason to be worried about that? I've—uh—I've got a lot of interest in helpin' your mom through this. Makin' sure that she doesn't have to worry about things, at least as far as I can help it, and if that's somethin' she oughta worry about, then I'd like at least a heads up."

Henry laughed to himself.

"I'm not going anywhere," Henry said. "she's my mom."

"I get that," Daryl said. "And I appreciate the sentiment. What I was mostly wondering was if you intended to—not so much as go away entirely, but mostly go away. And, if, while you were around, you were thinkin' about steadily dragging her feelings through the damn mud because you're pissed off or—whatever."

Henry raised his eyebrows at Daryl and Daryl raised his in response. Carol might not approve of him being quite so direct with Henry, but he didn't really know any other way to be. He might pretend his lawn chair was a throne and pontificate at Henry for an hour or two like his father did, but that wasn't really Daryl's style.

"Can I ask you something?" Henry asked.

"I don't care," Daryl said. "Ask away."

"You mean that?" Henry asked.

"What?" Daryl asked.

"Do you mean that—I can ask you whatever I want to ask you?"

Daryl considered it. That question sounded a great deal more loaded than the question before it had sounded. Still, this was Carol's son. If he stayed—and Daryl desperately hoped he stayed for Carol's sake—he was going to be part of Daryl's life, even if they hadn't worked out exactly what their relationship might be.

"Ask me what you want," Daryl said. "But it's a two-way street."

Henry nodded his head.

"Any time I want?" Henry asked.

"If it's appropriate," Daryl said. "But—like I said, two-way street."

Henry nodded his head again.

"Do you love her?" Henry asked.

Daryl laughed to himself.

"Boy, you jump right to it," he said. "Thought I was bein' too direct."

"I mean it," Henry said. "I want to know. She says she loves you. She says she loves you like she doesn't love anyone else. She says she loves you like she's never loved anybody before." He shook his head at Daryl. "She's not ashamed to say it. So, I want to know, do you love her?"

Daryl's pulse picked up.

He wasn't one to say the words, mostly because he hadn't used them all that much in his life. They tasted foreign on his tongue, even though they practically echoed in his ears like a heartbeat when Carol was around. Carol accepted that he sometimes had difficulty with words. She accepted that he might not always say what he was thinking.

But he wanted to learn to say the words more often. He wanted to say them freely and openly. The way to do that, perhaps, was to practice. Daryl remembered what Ezekiel had told him—it would matter to Henry.

Daryl cleared his throat.

"I—love your mom," Daryl said. It didn't sound as strange as he'd feared it would. "I never really loved that much before, so I can't say that I have a lot to compare it, too, but I do know—I know what I feel."

"And you love her more than you'll ever love anyone else?" Henry asked.

"Never loved anyone like her before," Daryl said. "And—I don't imagine that it's gonna change. At least—I'm not going looking for it."

"So, you want—the happily ever after, too?" Henry asked.

Daryl laughed to himself.

"Ain't that what everybody wants?" Daryl asked. "Hell—I don't have to run a whole damn Kingdom to wanna find myself a queen an' live happily ever after."

"And Mom's your queen?" Henry asked.

"You see anybody else in my life?" Daryl asked. "Henry—I know you love the hell outta your mom. And I ain't never gonna try to stop that or come between you or nothin'. She loves you even when she's not awake. She's in there, hopefully passed out and sleepin' good, and she's still just steady lovin' you. I won't stand between her and anything that makes her happy. More'n that? I want her to have whatever makes her happy, even if it don't make me happy. So, if you're worried that I'm some kinda sonofabitch that come here to—snatch your mom away, take her off somewhere, and make her miserable? You got the whole wrong idea. I won't hurt her on purpose, and I don't intend to let no damn body else hurt her, either."

"Even if it's me?" Henry asked. Daryl smirked. He thought he heard a bit of challenge in the boy's voice.

"It's the only damn time you an' me would have trouble," Daryl said. "But I'ma tell you right now, same as my brother told me, it's always best not to start a fight you ain't got a snowball's chance in hell to win."

"Maybe I feel the same way," Henry said. "I don't want her to get hurt."

"Then we got a lot in common," Daryl said. "But you didn't exactly answer my question. Just 'cause you don't want her to get hurt, don't mean you don't never hurt her. You gonna run off?"

"I'm here," Henry offered.

"You gonna—drag her feelings through the damn mud?" Daryl asked. "Make her feel like shit 'cause you'd rather she was at the Kingdom with your dad?"

"I talked to both of them," Henry said. "And I realized that it's not about what I want. At least, not entirely. So now I just want them both to be happy."

"That's big of you," Daryl offered.

"And if you're what makes mom happy," Henry said, though he left the statement open-ended. Daryl laughed to himself.

"Does that mean I got your blessing or some shit?" Daryl asked.

"Just don't make me regret it," Henry said.

Daryl swallowed down his amusement.

"Yeah, alright," he said. "Don't worry about it. I won't."

"I brought stuff with me," Henry said. "Some clothes and—a few things I'd like to have around."

"I know," Daryl said. "Take either room you want, but the one on this side of the house is a little bigger. We gonna clear out the other room for the baby eventually."

"I know," Henry said. "I unpacked. I'll probably go back to the Kingdom tomorrow or the day after…"

"Whatever you want," Daryl said.

"I thought I might leave my stuff here, though," Henry said. "So—I could come back any time I wanted. And I wouldn't have to, you know, pack things."

Daryl was relieved to hear that Henry intended to return with some frequency. That knowledge would make Carol rest better. At least she wouldn't feel like Henry was abandoning her or punishing her for some perceive abandonment on her part.

"Good," Daryl offered.

"You don't mind?" Henry asked.

"Mind what?" Daryl asked.

"Me leaving my stuff here," Henry said. "Coming back—whenever I want."

"Long as you come regular enough to suit your mom," Daryl said, "I don't care how you handle your comin' an' goin'."

"I didn't want to interrupt anything," Henry said. "Now that you two are living out here."

"Yeah," Daryl said, "we'll tone down the wild-ass parties when we see you comin'. Listen—you come when you want. Your mom would like to see more of you and I already spoke my peace. You don't hurt her and you and me ain't gonna have no trouble. That's all I really gotta say about it."

Henry laughed quietly beside Daryl.

"You're right, then," Henry said. "We do have a lot in common."