Carol and Daryl walked back to the House of the Future. The smell had abated from earlier this morning, but they should probably still give it another night before they moved in, Carol thought. None of the gang was there. Rick was off teaching Lori and the kids about firearms, and who knew where everyone else was.

Daryl opened the main refrigerator. "Kind ya want? Heineken? Coors? Budweiser? Miller? Oh! There's one Corona! Want that?"

"Sounds like you want that. I think I'll have one of those single-serve bottles of wine instead." She felt like her nerves were still jumping from the kill.

"How 'bout one of each color?" he asked.

"Yeah," she agreed. Red and white. She deserved two glasses of wine. She had just made her second kill, after all, the first by stabbing, and it would settle her nerves.

He reached back and began handing her the single-serve bottles one by one: Woodbridge Cabernet, Woordbridge Chardonnay, and then a Barefoot Rosé .

"Oh, three colors," she said.

"Those are the only colors they got. Want two of the pink ones?"

"No. I think three is plenty."

He grabbed two cans of beers and slipped them into the depths of his cargo pockets on the legs of his dark green pants. Then he seized the bottled of Corona and let the door slide shut.

"I don't know if I should even have three," she said, holding two little bottles in one hand and one in the other.

"Why not? Must be a thousand cans and bottles of beer in this park. Gotta make room in the fridge 'fore it all spoils."

"I guess I can't argue with that." She slipped one of the little bottles in each of her jeans pockets and the third in the little front pocket on her new, long-sleeve, button-down blouse. It was a light pink color with the words "Fun Kingdom" stitched in thick black cursive across the pocket. "But let's not drink in this stinky house."

"Where to?" He grabbed a Fun Kingdom bottle opener magnet off the fridge and popped the cap off his Corona. He slapped the magnet back on the fridge but left the cap on the floor as he began walking for the front door. They were going to have to discuss cleaning up after oneself if they were going to be living together.

"Tunnel of Courtly Love?" she teased as she trailed after him.

"Pfft."

Outside, Carol fell in place beside him, almost shoulder to shoulder. "Why?" she asked. "Where do you think we should drink?"

"Got an idea."

He walked her to the lake by the Ferriss wheel. Five pedalboats, bound by ropes, floated on the green-black surface of the water near the dock. Against the rail of the dock there leaned the fishing pole he'd used earlier today.

"We're going to pedal out and drink on the lake?" she asked.

"Me? Ain't peddling no damn boat. Just thought I'd drop a line while we drank."

"Well, you might have more luck catching something in the middle of the lake. And it seems peaceful out there. Weather's nice." It was sunny and probably close to a perfect 70 degrees. "There's a gentle breeze. "

"A'ight. Whatever you say, Miss Murphy, Walker Slayer. It's your damn party." He walked over, plucked up his fishing pole, and laid it in back of one of the boats, behind the seats.

"You can call me Carol, you know."

"I kind of like Miss Murphy. You ever pedaled one of these things?" He motioned to the boat with his beer. "'Cause I ain't done it and I ain't gonna."

"You just pedal like you would a bicycle." She began walking toward the boat. "We went out on one when Ed and I took Sophia here. Sophia and I did, I mean. Ed wouldn't be caught dead pedaling a boat."

"Well, neither would I," Daryl said. "I ain't pedaling." He pointed his beer at her. "You are."

"But you'll go out there with me on the water?"

"Sure. If that's what you want."

"Sounds like a date," she teased.

"Pfft."

Carol smirked. "I mean, I just want to clarify you're not expecting anything out there."

"Hell would I be expecting?"

"You're not carrying any condoms or cock rings in those bottomless pockets?"

Daryl flushed red. "Stahp."

"What is a cock ring, anyway? I'm as ignorant as Glenn on that subject."

"Wanna get on this boat or not?" he asked.

"Seriously, tell me. You've been giving me an education all week. Might as well enlighten my ignorance about one more thing."

"Fine. If you must know, Miss Murphy, 's so a guy can keep it up longer."

"Oh?" She raised an eyebrow.

"Which I only know 'cause Merle had a few!" he said defensively. "Claimed it made it so he could bang all night long if he wanted to. Though I don't know why the hell someone would want to do that. Just pop and stop." He closed his eyes as if he regretted what he'd just said, opened them, half shook his head, and looked down at the planks on the dock.

"Pop and stop," Carol repeated. "I did prefer that with Ed. Although there wasn't much popping. Not for me anyway." She sighed. "But I had boyfriend once. Pre-Ed. When I was 20. And with him…I liked a second or third round sometimes."

Daryl cautiously raised his eyes again. He took another sip of his beer. "So why didn't you stay with him then?"

"He moved. For a job opportunity. And he didn't ask me to move with him."

"Moron." Daryl took the last swig of beer in his bottle and then he tossed it into the overgrown grassy bank beyond the dock. "Let's get this boat going. Let's see how fast those short little legs of yours can pedal." He climbed into the passenger seat.

"I'm five foot six," Carol insisted as she sat down and took the wheel. "That's two inches more than average for a woman. And you aren't exactly tall yourself, you know." She began pedaling. "You have to pedal, too, so it goes faster."

"Nah. I got faith in you." He reached into the front pocket of his cut-off flannel shirt, took out the sunglasses he'd looted yesterday, and slid them on his face. Then he rested his neck on his laced-together hands with his arms stretched out behind himself, leaned back his head, and closed his eyes. "You'll get us there."

[*]

The whirring sound of the pedals stopped abruptly and the boat slowly glided on the lake, gradually inching to a stop. Daryl heard a click. He opened his eyes. Carol had leaned back in the seat and put her feet up on the dash of the pedalboat and unscrewed the cap of her pink wine. She slipped the cap back into her pocket – he didn't know why she didn't just toss it on the floor of the boat – was she saving it for something? – and took a sip.

They were in the middle of the lake, beyond the reach of the shadow of the Ferris wheel. He got up, got the fishing pole, and cast the line. Then he jammed it between the seat and the wall of the boat so it would stand up by itself, sat back down, and fished a can of beer out of his cargo pocket.

"You're pedaling back," she informed him. "Because I'm not. I'm going to be three bottles in."

"Three glasses." He popped his beer open and took a sip.

"Yes, but I'm so short. I have such stubby little legs. That third glass will surely knock me over." She turned and looked at him through narrowed eyes.

"Sorry," he muttered. His eyes dipped instinctively to her cleavage. She'd unbuttoned the top two buttons of her blouse at some point. He had no idea when she'd done that. It sure as hell hadn't been like that during the knife lessons.

It was okay, he thought, she couldn't see what he was looking at behind these dark sunglasses. Still, he didn't let his vision linger long. Better not to think about that. She probably thought he was an impotent loser anyway, a guy who could barely get it up and then couldn't keep it up. Pop and stop. What the hell had he been thinking? Why had he said that to her? She just got him all flustered, bringing up cock rings like that, making him explain, talking about her personal shit, her twenty-year-old sex life. He wondered what she had looked liked at twenty.

Stop it. Just stop it! he told himself. You made a damn fool of yourself already, Mr. Pop and Stop.

Why did he care what she thought of him anyway?

But he did care. That was the goddamn problem right there. He did care. But why did he care? Maybe because she actually seemed to think well of him, and he didn't want to fuck that up. Women didn't think well of him. Mostly they didn't think of him at all, unless they wanted a quick, rough fuck, with no strings attached, in which case they weren't really thinking about him at all. But Carol seemed to think well of him. Or she had. Now she probably thought of him as Mr. Pop and Stop.

"Ain't like I never got a woman off," he said.

Oh fuck, why had he said that? She was looking at him now. That must have seemed like it came out of nowhere.

Now he tried to recover himself: "Talkin' 'bout pop and stop. Didn't mean pop and stop. I mean, yeah, I meant pop and stop but I didn't mean just me popping and stopping." He was talking so fast now, he could hear himself picking up nervous speed, but he couldn't put the brakes on. "Meant both of us popping and stopping. I mean not you and me!" Stop, stop, stop the words. "Mean me and whoever. Stopping after the popping." He never talks. Why is he talking? Why are these words flowing out of his mouth? "Didn't mean I ain't popped a woman. I've popped plenty of women. Lots of women!" Oh shit, now he sounded like he was some kind of poon hound. "Not lots. I don't mean lots. I just mean more than two like you."

"I haven't popped any women," Carol said calmly. His stew of words hadn't frightened her. They hadn't even stunned her into silence. She was smiling. "And what makes you think I've only had sex with two men?"

"Uh…Ed and that other guy you mentioned. That's two."

"That other guy I mentioned, when I was 20? He was my second boyfriend. Ed was my fifth. I didn't marry Ed until I was 26."

"Oh. So…Why'd you pick him?"

"Because he asked. He asked to marry me. And the others didn't. And when he did…" She sighed. "I was struggling to make ends meet. I told you I helped save the family house by dropping out of high school to work overtime when my dad died?"

Daryl nodded.

"Well, three years later we mortgaged it again to the hilt to pay my mother's medical bills when she got cancer. She couldn't work then, so it was just me paying the bills. After she died, the bank took the house, and I was scraping by. I'd never gotten more than my GED. Four raises in seven years at that diner, and I was still only up to $7.15 an hour, with tips. This was back when minimum wage was $5.15," she clarified.

"Damn. Even I was making' $8 an hour diggin' holes for fence posts 'bout that time. Cash under the table, too, so no taxes."

"Well, Ed was making close to $16. As a plumber. And at the time, he was charming. In his way. Exciting. I mistook his jealousy for flattery and his possessiveness for dedication. I didn't see the red flags. Or, more likely, I pretended not to see them, because I was struggling. And pretty soon I was pregnant. Sophia was born seven months after we got married."

"Oh."

"So now you know my age."

26 + 7 months + Sophia's 11.5, Daryl calculated. 38.

"Surprised?" she asked. "Everyone thinks I'm well over 40."

"Who's everyone?" Daryl asked.

"Everyone. How old did you think I was?"

"37," he said.

"Liar. How old are you?"

He sipped, murmured, and lowered the can. "Everyone thinks I'm under 40."

Carol's mouth dropped open in surprise.

"Because I am," he added.

Carol reached over and slapped him on the leg. He hadn't been expecting that, and he jumped defensively. She pulled her hand away quickly.

"37," he said hastily, trying to draw attention away from his over- reaction to her playful touch. "I think. Maybe 36. Don't keep track. Didn't do birthdays in my family." He gestured with the beer can toward the little bottle she was nursing. "How's the wine?"

"Pretty awful," she admitted. "But I'm going to drink it anyway. All three colors."

"Well, you deserve it. You learn fast."

"I do?"

He nodded. "Spewed all those terms back at me. And you take correction well. Damn well. Most women…they get pissy at you."

"Like what women?" she took a sip of her wine.

"You ever seen Lori when Rick tries to teach her somethin'? Or Andrea when Shane told her she wasn't loadin' that rifle right back at Fort Benning? He had to wait for it to jam on her before she'd hear him out. And, well… I did try to teach someone else once. When I was in my early twenties. This woman…I used to…uh…date?"

"Is that a question?" Carol asked.

"Had sex, and sometimes we watched TV together. Hung out sometimes. I took her to this bar once. We played some pool. And once I offered to teach her to use m'crossbow. Thought it would be...you know…something to do together. Well, she got real pissy. Didn't like me correcting her. We got in a big fight over it. Later that night…she fucked Merle."

"And he knew you were dating her?"

"Maybe I wasn't," he said and took another swig of the beer.

"Did you care about her?"

He shrugged. "She had a good…uh…I liked the fuckin'. And I liked when she'd bring me a beer or tell people, you know, he's a great shot with a crossbow. He's a good hunter. Like she was almost proud of me. But…then again…she wasn't nice to me sometimes. She'd put me down in front of other people sometimes. Bitched at me a lot. A lot. For real dumb ass shit." Why was he telling her any of this? "Thought she was my girl though. So, I got a little pissed off at Merle that he gave in when she came onto him."

"I imagine you were a little pissed off," Carol said.

"Wasn't his fault though."

"No?" Carol asked.

"I mean, hell's a man gonna do if some woman's throwing herself at him?"

"If it's your brother's girlfriend? You say no."

"Maybe she wasn't. My girlfriend. Maybe I just thought she was. Misunderstood."

"Maybe she was your girlfriend," Carol replied. "And maybe Merle didn't do right by you." She threw back the last of that little bottle of wine. She tucked the empty bottle in her front shirt pocket. She drew out another, unscrewed the cap, and ticked that in a pocket, too. Was she collecting them? "I know Merle was you brother – "

"- Is. Is my brother. He's still out there somewhere. Only found his hand. And ain't no one can kill Merle but Merle."

"I know he is your brother. But he isn't good for you."

"What?"

"You're different," Carol said quietly. "Since Merle…" She trailed off. He must have gotten a dark look, because she apologized.

"Nah, say it. Whatever you were gonna say."

"You're different since Merle disappeared."

"How so?"

She sipped her wine – the dark red one this time – and then said, "It's like you were a boy. And then, once you had to go it alone…in a short time…suddenly…you became a man. You stepped up. For the sake of the group, you stepped up. You rescued Sophia, you took the lead in the caravan, you started planning for the future. You weren't just following Merle anymore."

He looked at her through the dark shades of his sunglasses.

"I don't mean it as an insult," she said. "If that's how you're taking it. God knows I wasn't of much use a month ago. I was a cowering little girl. At least you could survive on your own."

Daryl sipped his beer and looked out at the murky dark green waters of the lake. "Guess…guess maybe we both been creepin' out from under shadows."

"Growing out from under them," she said. "Like jasmine." She turned and smiled at him. She had such a soft, pretty smile. So goddamn pure.

There was a tug on his line, and he was grateful for the distraction, the excuse to look away and stand. He left the beer can resting on his seat and reeled it in. The fish was a decent enough size, but he tossed it back.

"What did you do that for?" she asked. "We could have grilled it up tonight!"

"Nah. Catch it again another day. Ain't got a cooler to put it in." He grabbed his beer and sat back down.

The truth was, he didn't want to have to turn back when he'd caught a few fish to keep them fresh. He liked being out here with her. The weather was perfect. The toads were croaking, and the fall crickets singing somewhere in the overgrown grass at the edge of the lake. He took another swig of the beer and put his feet up on the dash of the boat, just like her. "This is the life," he said.

She chuckled. "Your life hasn't changed all that much since the dead started walking, has it?"

"Not like yours."

"In some ways," she said. "I think maybe mine has changed for the better. Don't get me wrong. All this horror...I wish the world hadn't ended…and I dread for Sophia growing up in this one…" She sighed. "But, in some ways…"

"Yeah," he said. He supposed she meant Ed being out of her life. That and she was so much more confident now. More herself, maybe.

"But where does the world go from here?" she asked.

"Starts over I reckon. Like with Adam and Eve."

"And who are Adam and Eve?" she asked. "Rick and Lori?"

"Yeah. Maybe Shane and Andrea. Sophia and Carl."

"Don't say that." She scrunched up her face and took another sip of wine.

"You know it's bound to happen someday."

"I don't like it," Carol told him. "Carl's a decent boy with a decent father who will raise him to be a decent man. But I don't like it. That she might one day have a choice between only him and…celibacy."

"There's always Glenn," Daryl said.

Carol gasped with disgust.

"Nah, calm down! Didn't mean anytime soon. But, hell, when she's 20, he'll be, what, 34? And horny as hell, poor guy, after nine years of no sex." He chuckled to himself. "Probably 34 years of no sex. Poor kid's probably a virgin."

"Why did you have to say that?" she asked.

Daryl shrugged.

"We have got to find other survivors!" Carol insisted. "Should we go looking?"

"Hell no, we shouldn't go lookin'! Can't trust people."

"There have to be some decent people somewhere."

"We got to be careful. People in this world." He gritted his teeth. "The one's with devils inside. Old law restrained 'em. Fear of gettin' caught. But there ain't no laws no more, except might makes right. And they finally feel like this is their chance to do whatever the hell they want."

"What was in that house?" Carol asked suddenly.

Daryl closed his eyes. He sipped his beer blindly.

"Just tell me. My imagination is far worse than anything you can tell me."

He opened his eyes and stared out at the lake. "Found the skeleton of a woman, eaten alive, 'cause she was chained naked to the bed, because that security guard been raping her, maybe for a couple days. He died when was doing it, heart attack maybe, and turned, and ate her alive. He'd shot the other two security guards so he'd be free to do it. Don't know if you noticed the gunshot wound to the chest in the one you stabbed."

Carol looked like she was about to vomit. "Okay. I was wrong. My imagination is not worse."

"Understand why we can't go looking for survivors now?" he asked.

Carol took a shaky sip of her wine. She lowered it. "But there have to be some good ones. Nothing brutal happened in the quarry camp. And they were taking care of the old people at that nursing home where – "

"- and they were all slaughtered. All of 'em. Execution style," Daryl reminded her. "When strangers came into their camp, it was wiped the hell out."

"Not when you came into it. You and Rick and T-Dog and Glenn. You all parted peacefully. You left them guns."

"Rick left them guns. I'd of kept the guns. Fat lot of good they did that camp."

"We found more guns," she reminded him. "There was evil in the old world too. Murder. Rape. Muggings. Even serial killers. It hasn't changed that much. We have to be careful, of course, but that doesn't mean we never expand our camp."

"Well I ain't goin' lookin' for trouble, I'll tell you that right now. Those days are gone. 'Cause I'm a man now and not a boy." He lowered his sunglasses and peered over the top of them at her. "Ain't that what you said?" He pushed the sunglasses back up again. "And only boys go lookin' for trouble. Grown ass men tend to their own."

"Their own?" Carol asked.

"Yeah."

"And who's your own?"

"Y'all. You. The girl. The boy. Rick and Lori, T-Dog and Glenn, Andrea and Shane."

"And why's that? How did we become your own?"

He shrugged. "Just did. Somewhere 'tween the quarry and Fun Kingdom…y'all just…did."

"Then couldn't other people become your own?"

Daryl tossed his empty beer can on the floor of the boat, drew the last one out from his pocket, and cracked it. "Tell ya what. If - while we're out looking for them seeds, or out on some other supply run sometime – we happen to find people who don't seem like murderin' rapist assholes…maybe. Maybe we take 'em in. But what are the odds? We've seen one living person since we left the quarry camp. One. And he blew himself to shit and took one of ours right along with him. Almost took a second."

"Maybe you're right." She drained her bottle and slid it empty into her jeans pocket. She fished out the third and final one and said, "Can we change the subject to something lighter? We're on a paddleboat. This should be fun."

Yeah, he'd killed the mood somewhere along the way. He wasn't sure how he'd done it. He wasn't any good at this talking to a woman thing. "A'ight. What?"

"Bocephus."

"What now?" he asked.

"That's my guess. For your middle name. It's what Hank William, Jr.'s father called him."

"Bocephus? Yeah, no, ain't Bocephus."

"Bartholomew."

"Nah."

"Bruce."

Daryl shook his head. "Told ya. Ain't never gonna guess it."

"All right, Rumpelstiltskin."

"That don't start with a B."

"I was referencing the fairytale. You know, where Rumpelstiltskin takes the first-born child of the miller's daughter in exchange for spinning straw into gold, and to get the baby back, she has to guess his name. Do I need to take you to the Fairytale Kingdom section of the park to educate you?"

"Sorry, my mama didn't exactly read me fairytales at night."

"But she taught you the story of flowers?" Carol asked. "Of jasmine?"

"Nah. Old Lady Jasper taught me that."

"And who was Old Lady Jasper?"

It was easier to talk to Carol than most people, Daryl thought. He just had to answer her questions. She kept him talking, kept the conversation going, like they were playing ping pong. "She was this old widow woman in the neighborhood. In the trailer park where my daddy and I lived after the cabin burned down. Used to do chores for her on account of she would feed me when I did. Good food, too. She had all these flowers. Shit trailer, but she kept it nice, you know, clean and decorated, like a real home almost. Had flowers in pots everywhere. Used to like to talk at me." He moved his fingers like a running mouth. "Tell me 'bout 'em. Learned all the stories. Story of the jasmine. Story of the Cherokee rose. Legend of the Bluebonnet. All of 'em."

"She sounds like a nice woman."

"She was. Went over to take out her trash one day and found her dead at the kitchen table."

"That must have been rough. How old were you?"

"Oh, fourteen by then. Ain't like it was the first dead body I'd ever seen." So much for cheery subjects. "How's that last wine?"

"The white color is my favorite so far," she said. "Brayden."

"Brayden! Fuckin' rich white boys' name. Think my folks would name me Brayden?"

She chuckled. "Bryson. Bentley." Now she was rolling out all the rich white boy names. "Blake. Beckham. Barrett."

"Stahp."

"Fine, I'll ration my guesses to three a day from here on out. By Christmas, I'll have guessed your name."

He smirked.

They finished their last drinks while they talked about the old world and what they missed about it. He caught and threw back one more fish. But as the sun began to shift position in the sky, she said, "We better head back. Sophia will be wondering what happened to me."

Daryl reluctantly put one foot on each pedal and told her, "You tell anyone 'bout me pedaling this boat, and I'll end you." It was good he helped, though, because her feet kept slipping off the pedals, and she kept laughing.

When they were back at the dock, she took the two beer cans he'd thrown in the bottom of the boat, walked (swaying just a little) to the edge of the dock, and put them in a trash can. She also pulled out here three little empty wine bottles and caps and tossed them in too. So that's what she'd been saving them for.

When she walked back toward him, she almost tripped on her own feet, and he caught her by the arm to steady her. "You are a light weight, Miss Murphy," he told her.

"Well, three glasses in two hours and I haven't eaten since breakfast. Can I trust you to walk me back and not take advantage?"

"Pffft!"

He did walk her back, occasionally reaching out an arm to steady her, sometimes by her arm, once around her waist for a brief moment. They stopped halfway at a bench near an ice cream stand they'd yet to loot. She sat down and he brought her crushed peanuts and sugar sprinkles and one of the root beers they'd used for floats. She hummed while she ate. When they stood again, she was steady on her feet. Daryl was a little disappointed that she was, because now he didn't have an excuse to reach out and grab her anymore.