AN: Here we are, another chapter here.
I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think!
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Daryl did not think of himself as a man who knew much about women. He had, essentially, studied women much like he might have studied any kind of wildlife. Throughout his life, he'd mostly remained at a distance, and he'd mostly gathered information like he simply intended to learn more about a very different—and potentially dangerous—species. For the most part, though, he'd had very little close, and especially intimate, contact with women. He knew some of their habits. He'd witnessed some of their rituals. He knew some basic trivia about them.
He knew that two women together was either good or bad, and that could change in a matter of seconds. Women would either bond with each other and fight ferociously for one another—fangs and claws bared against anyone or anything that would get near the other—or they would turn those very same fangs and claws on one another.
Daryl had been told that women could be more emotional than men. He'd heard that, a thousand times over, from every man he'd ever heard pontificating about women. He wasn't entirely convinced, though, that women were all that much more emotional than men. Rather, he thought that women simply seemed to give their emotions more free-rein and, perhaps, they had a few that they used more regularly than the ones that men chose.
Daryl had been told that women, in general, were the softer and more delicate members of the species. He knew that women certainly had a soft side—or at least some of them did, and he imagined they all had, at one time or another, had such a side before something calloused it over like sandpaper on tender skin—but he did not believe them to be simply "soft." At least—he didn't believe them all to be simply "soft," even though he'd seen a few that just didn't know when to guard their underbelly, but that was true in men, too.
Daryl had been told that women, especially around certain times of the month, were unpredictable and more dangerous than usual. In general, he'd decided not to underestimate women no matter the time of the month, and that seemed to work out for him. It didn't matter what day it was, he already knew that women were complex—and, just maybe, they were more complex than men or, at the very least, more complex than most of the men that Daryl had known in his life—and it was best to simply remember that when dealing with them.
Daryl knew that any female, of any species, was a thousand times more ferocious when her offspring was involved. Hell had never created a creature any more ruthless or intense than a mother defending her young. At least—Daryl knew that such a thing applied to women who were good at being mothers. There were, though, plenty of mothers, he knew, that were simply not quite wired right for the job, just as there were men that were not quite wired right for the job.
And he knew, even though he knew next-to-nothing-at-all about the condition, that women were an entirely different animal when they were expecting young. He'd heard stories, of course, but he'd never been in truly close contact with one before. Lori had been his very first experience spending any amount of time in close proximity to an expectant mother trying to grow a little one—and already he was learning that one, especially when that one had been Lori, didn't teach him about all women.
For all his study of women before, he already knew that nothing had prepared him for what he was about to embark on. He had voluntarily moved himself from his isolated camp to a veritable sea of estrogen. In one home, he would be living with Carol, who was carrying his daughter and, he assumed, such a thing might even create some kind of double, or even triple, strength estrogen load in one human body. He would also be living with Michonne and Judith.
He, RJ, and Dog were the sole men of the household, for the moment.
And Daryl was well aware the he was working with a very limited knowledge of the species that now surrounded him.
He laughed to himself as he laid in bed, just coming into wakefulness, and thought about everything. He laughed to himself, remembering those old documentary television shows that he liked to watch—he could remember one about penguins, in particular, that had been pretty fascinating—and he could imagine the asshole that seemed hired to narrate every one of those documentaries suddenly giving voice to his life.
Daryl heard the noises that had roused him out of his sleep again. He'd almost thought he'd made them up as he was coming into consciousness. They'd stopped for half a second, but then they'd started again.
Around him, the space was just showing the light of dawn. The sun was coming up outside, and it was filtering in through the windows to illuminate the space. For a quick moment, Daryl had forgotten where he was upon waking, but it didn't take him long to remember that he was in the basement of Michonne's house, and he had convinced Carol that they could make a home out of the space. They could settle there, at least for a while, and allow her to grow their little one and to bring her into the world.
Daryl sat up as his brain slowly identified the sound as one of struggle. Immediate panic flared up inside him, but he quickly calmed as he realized that the grunting was not a Walker or anything as equally heinous.
It was Carol.
He had another surge of panic until he realized, knees shaking as he was halfway out of the bed, that she was not in pain.
"Could you please stop that?" Daryl asked. He reached for the cigarettes on the bedside table. "You're strugglin' with somethin' and I don't think that's good for you."
Carol did stop. She walked just enough for him to see her around the corner of the attic that marked the staircase and somewhat divided the area.
"I'm trying to push that couch over here," Carol said. "I think we'll like it better if it's closer to this area. We can talk easily from the bed. And it'll be closer to the little fireplace. And it won't be in the way like it is right now."
Daryl laughed to himself, but he swallowed it down.
That was another thing he was just learning about women. When they were pregnant, apparently, they had an overwhelming need to nest sometimes. He wasn't sure what that meant, exactly, and Michonne had somewhat stammered and stuttered when she'd tried to explain it. It involved making their space perfect so that they felt safe, secure, and content to carry and deliver their child there. That was the basic understanding that Daryl had of the process. He also understood that it may wax and wane throughout the pregnancy.
"How about you don't do that?" Daryl offered. "Let me help, at least, in a couple minutes?"
"You know," Carol offered, stepping fully into view, "I'm not helpless just because I'm pregnant."
She was standing, hands on her hips, in nothing more than the button-down shirt of his that she'd claimed as a nightgown and socks. Her hair was down, spilling in tangled curls over her shoulders, and her cheeks were red. She'd been toiling at whatever she'd decided to do for a while.
There was challenge in her voice.
"It took me and three other men to move that couch down here. It's got a pull-out mattress in it. Weighs a fuckin' ton. I'd rather you weren't tryin' to haul it around on your own," Daryl said. He lit the cigarette he hadn't gotten around to lighting yet. "You ain't helpless 'cause you pregnant, and I weren't meaning to imply that, and I'm not meaning to imply that now, but…you are pregnant. And we're all gonna do everything we can to make sure that'cha stay that way and everything goes good. One of the things I'm expectin' from you then—beggin' from you, even—is that you don't make that harder on any of us than it has to be."
Carol glared at him. Then her expression softened.
"I'm not trying to make anything difficult," she said.
Daryl patted the bed beside him. Carol didn't come, so he patted the mattress again.
"I know you aren't tryin' to make anything difficult, but…just don't try to move the couch, OK? If you want it moved, I'll get some help an' we'll move it. Ten times a day if that's what it takes to make you happy."
Carol frowned, but she walked over and sat down beside him.
"I don't want it moved ten times a day," she said. "But—I thought if we move the bed to that wall, it'll make this space a little nicer and a little more…apart, I guess. We can put the couch over there. I think—the rocking chair near the fire? So, it'll be warm when we're rocking the baby."
"Baby's gonna come after the winter, ain't she?" Daryl asked.
Carol shrugged her shoulders.
"It won't warm up right away," Carol said. "Especially not in the basement. It's already cold down here."
It was cold.
"You ain't wearin' pants, and you're wandering around out from under the blanket," Daryl said. "But—it's kinda cold down here. I'll work on getting a fire going in there later."
"I didn't mean to give you a list of things to do," Carol said.
Daryl laughed to himself.
"I need a list of things to do," Daryl said. "And I'd rather hear from you what you want than be left to figure that shit out on my own. I ain't no damn good at that."
Carol leaned into him. She touched his face and pulled it to her. She kissed his jaw and kissed his neck until he shivered and the shiver ran through him.
"You gotta stop," he warned her.
"What if I don't want to stop?" Carol asked.
"That's fine," Daryl ceded. "Long as you don't want me to stop. If you gonna want me to stop, then I'm tellin' you that you gotta stop."
She laughed near his ear. He knew that laugh. It was impish. Mischievous. It sent another shiver running through his body.
"I think you're good at figuring out what you need to do," Carol said, kissing his neck in between words. Daryl put the cigarette out because, for a moment, he wasn't even sure he could hold onto it. He closed his eyes. The sensation of her kisses and the sound of her voice was enough to have his whole body reacting to her. She had him in the palm of her hand, and there would be no use for him to even try to deny that fact. She didn't abuse that control that she had over him, though, so he didn't mind giving it to her. "You're so good at figuring out what you should do. For me."
Carol slipped her hand down under the blanket. Daryl had never bothered dressing the night before. She wrapped her hand around him and he groaned at her. She ducked her head, kissing his chest and working her way down, slowly lowering herself to the floor as she went.
"Hey," Daryl managed to get out, catching her by the top of her arm to pull on her and stop her descent toward the floor.
"Shhh," she breathed out to him. She smiled at him from her spot on the floor, where her knees had touched down. "Don't worry. I don't want you to stop. I want you to—relax." She pulled at her arm, quietly requesting her freedom. Daryl held tight to it, though, not entirely sure why he felt the need to protest. "Daryl?" She breathed out. He hummed at her. "You're hurting my shoulder," she offered.
"Sorry," Daryl said, letting go of her arm. She settled on her knees and pushed the blanket out of the way. She ran her tongue up the length of him and it was all that he could do to keep himself even seated on the edge of the bed. Just that simple sensation practically had him wanting to jump up to the ceiling. "Sweet Jesus," he breathed out.
She laughed.
"You like it?" She asked.
"You don't gotta do that," he said. "Somethin' about—you down on your knees in front of me like that. I don't like seein' it. What it makes me think of."
"Then close your eyes," Carol offered, relaxing for a moment and looking up at him. She was still holding him, nonchalantly and gently, in her hand. It was clear that she wasn't going to do anything he didn't want her to do, but she was also going to at least argue her case. "And think of—what it is. Not what it makes you think of."
"What you want me to think?" Daryl asked.
Carol smiled and rested her head against his thigh, for a second, in a gesture of affection.
"I want you to think that—you take good care of me, and I just want to take care of you," Carol said.
"You get anything out of it at all?" Daryl asked.
Carol turned her face to kiss his thigh. Then, she kissed it a little more passionately and less playfully.
"I get to take care of you," Carol said. "And—I want that as much as you ever want to take care of me."
Daryl's only response was to brush his fingers over her face and to smooth back a few of her curls before he closed his eyes—as she'd requested of him—and put his attention on enjoying the pleasure that she wanted to give him. He knew, from his own desires to please her, that the greatest gift he could give her, at this moment, was to simply enjoy what she was doing for him.
Daryl didn't think of himself as a man who knew much about women, but he was certainly learning—and enjoying every second of it.