May 3
6 AM
House of the Future

Carol awoke to the ticklish feel of Daryl's lips on the back of her neck. She squirmed, shifted, and felt his morning erection push against the small of her back. "I'm so tired," she murmured. "I don't have to work until eight."

"Need to hunt at sunrise," he murmured as he slipped a hand beneath her thin t-shirt, cupped a breast, and squeezed gently.

"Just because you're up doesn't mean I have to be up," she protested, but his teeth raking over her earlobe, and the gentle circle his thumb was making over her now hardening nipple quickly turned her protest into empty words. She rolled to face him and pressed her lips against his.

The lovemaking began lazily but soon grew heated, and it was only after she had screamed his name and was laying still shuddering in his arms that she remembered they'd left the window open last night to let in a cool spring night breeze.

Daryl kissed the top of her head and murmured, "Good mornin', Miss Murphy."

"Not the worst wake up I ever had," she admitted. "But don't do it tomorrow. I'm sleeping in."

"Could go back to sleep now."

"Well now I'm awake." Silence greeted her. She rose her head to look at him. She poked him in the shoulder with one finger and he snorted awake. "Didn't you say you had to go hunting?"

He grunted and made his way out of the bed and began dressing. Carol gradually did the same. She might as well start early on the gardening, before it got warm. Then she could have the afternoon for knife or firearms practice, or maybe some special time with the Sophia.

It had been three weeks since the raid at Grady Memorial. Tara's wound was much improved, and she had begun training some of the orderlies to be guards. Rosita had been back and forth to Grady to help with guarding and training. She had also brought Tom to investigate the portability of Grady's generator and solar panels. Tom had decided they could disassemble, transport them, and use them to power some of the little model town in the Kingdom of the West, which would give them extra housing. None of the buildings there had showers, but whoever ended up living there could use the showers in the locker rooms in Splash Kingdom, to which Tom and Milton had already gotten the water pumps running using the propane generators from Terminus.

The Board had ruled to loot – and close up – the Grady Memorial camp and assimilate all of its inhabitants whenever the last of the patients was healed up.

Their camp was gradually growing into a town. For the next year and a half, they had power and running water, but they needed to prepare for a time when the world's gas and propane would spoil, to learn from the past how to live in the future.

1:30 PM
The Kingdom

Gavin knew it wasn't a good sign when he arrived at the gates of the Kingdom for his weekly chance to see Frankie and she didn't immediately grab his hand and lead him back to her apartment in the old high school like she'd done the last three weeks.

He knew it wasn't a good sign that she'd missed their last radio check-in because she'd forgotten about an appointment, and that he'd end up chatting with Dianne about Coalition business instead. (They were calling themselves "The Coalition" now, all the communities of northern Virginia. The Coalition had established a joint trading post in the old Savior's outpost in Manassas and had entered a treaty of mutual defense, but the Sanctuary was still finding its legs. Things were better, more secure, but much work remained to be done.)

He knew wasn't a good sign that Frankie was now leading him somewhere private away from the people at work and at play, near the pig pen, where she leaned on the fence and looked at the pigs instead of him.

He knew none of these things were good signs, but he tried to pretend to himself he didn't know. "I missed you," he said.

"They're cute, aren't they?" Frankie asked. "The piglets?"

Gavin leaned on the top rail of the fence beside her and looked at the litter nursing from its mother. "The Kingdom will have some good pork soon. I wonder if Ezekiel will trade it for corn? It's starting to come in. You should come see. Stay a week." When she didn't answer right away, he found himself prattling on, "It's about the only crop we seem to be able to grow well there, and we grow more than we can eat. We're planning on making ethanol from it for fuel. So when the gas spoils, we'll have an alternate fuel source. We'll convert the generator and some of the vehicles to run on ethanol…We might not have much to offer now, but one day we may be the only community in the world with a steady supply of fuel to trade."

"You've accomplished a lot there, Gavin. But there's still a lot you want to accomplish, isn't there?" Frankie asked.

"By August, I think the Sanctuary might be self-sufficient. By the next election…I could move here. Probably."

"Gavin, I don't want you to give up turning that place into the community you'd like to see it become to move here for me. They still need you there for another term. And I'm settled here now. And…this hasn't been working. You know that, right?"

There it was. It was like a slap in the face, but, at the same time, almost a relief. He didn't want to hear it, but now that the other shoe had finally dropped, at least he wasn't anxiously waiting for it to drop anymore. "We could make it work," he said, not really believing his own words, but very much wanting to believe them.

"We want different things, Gavin. And we're in different places now. I still care about you, it's just – "

"- It's just Daniel, isn't it?" Now he finally looked at her.

She looked away from him and at the piglets. "I haven't lied to you or cheated on you. I wouldn't do that to you. That's why I'm coming to you first."

"Before you fuck him, you mean?"

"Gavin," she said in an almost scolding tone. "Come on. This isn't about Daniel."

"It's not? You aren't interested in him at all? Because I can sure as shit see he's interested in you."

"I am," Frankie admitted, "but that's not what this is about. I care about you, I do. But this isn't working. We both know it."

"You haven't tried to make it work," he hissed. "You've never once come back to the Sanctuary with me! You said you loved me, but maybe you just loved the idea of me overthrowing Negan."

"I said I loved you before I ever knew you were going to overthrow Negan! And I do love you. I love you. I love you because of who you are and what we've been through together and the way you've treated me. I love you, but I don't think you're the only person I'm capable of loving. And it isn't working. Not the way we both hoped it would. So I think maybe we should be…friends."

"Friends," he echoed dully. "Friends." He shook his head. "Fucking Daniel." He gripped the rail of the fence around the pig pen tightly.

"Don't take this out on him. Don't get in a fight with him. This isn't really about him."

Gavin pushed off the fence and paced away. Frankie didn't try to follow him. When he was several yards away, he kicked a metal trashcan – one of the ones they used to light fires at knight, so hard it echoed inside, and he hurt his toe, and felt like a fool as he limped on past a picnic table where Dianne sat sharpening arrowheads. "What did that trashcan ever do to you?" she asked.

He sat down on the bench opposite her and stretched out his leg to let his aching foot rest. "Just got some bad news is all."

She glanced in the direction of Frankie, who was now leaving the pig pen and walking in the opposite direction. "You knew that was coming. Unless you're an idiot. Which I suspect you're not."

"Maybe I am," he muttered.

"It sounds like what you need is a pint of Kingdom mead. For the road. Because you probably shouldn't stay in the Kingdom overnight. It's going to be awkward for you. But since you already planned to take two days away from the Sanctuary, come help me and Jerry move Hallowbrant."

"Move Hallowbrant?" he asked.

"The well that supplies the recovery center got contaminated somehow. And then that small herd trampled the gardens."

"You mean there's a place that's having more toruble than the Sanctuary?" he asked skeptically.

"It's too open. Too vulnerable. And frankly, it's no longer very inhabitable. Natania and Cyndie have scouted out a new location for their people, at some camp cabins on the Chesapeake Bay. It's a primitive beach resort of sorts."

"Really?"

"Frankly, it sounds like a great location. And it puts our communities and the trading post into a near perfect circle. Natania says fishing boats are still there. And they'll probably be able to supply the entire Coalition with fish in trade. But they need more capable guards for the journey, and another functioning truck with hitch. We could use your pick-up. You'd be back to the Sanctuary in two days, and they'd pay you ten pounds of fish in a week for your trouble, at the next trading post meet-up."

"All right then. Count me in."

"You drive. I'm your shotgun."

"Just with a bow instead of a shotgun?" Gavin asked.

Dianne smirked and glanced at the toe of his boot. "We'll get going as soon as that stops hurting."

3:30 PM
Fun Kingdom

"I wish Noah had stayed at Grady," Dixon muttered as he and Daryl walked out of the woods into the edge of the expansive Fun Kingdom parking lot, Daisy panting happily beside them. They'd bagged two wild turkeys today.

"Why?" Daryl asked. "Seems like a good kid. Carol thought'd be nice for you, not bein' the only man yer age 'round here."

"Beth wants him to hang out with us half the time. And I think he likes her."

"Ah."

Dixon shifted the rope he'd slung over his shoulder to carry his turkey. "You know…she dumped Jimmy for me. It's not like she can't change her mind again, when someone else comes along."

"Pffft. Come on, kid. Noah? Kid can't hunt. Can't shoot as well as you. Got them funny ears. You ain't got shit to worry 'bout. Ain't no competition at all."

"Beth says he's sweet. And she's…you know, she's sweet. And I'm not really the sweet type of guy."

Daisy trotted on a little ahead of Daryl now, chasing a butterfly. "Girls don't want sweet."

"I think Beth might."

"Nah, trust me. Sweet don't make a girl's panties wet."

"Carol said you're sweet to her."

"Ain't sweet to Carol," Daryl insisted. "Just love her. So I wanna do shit that makes her happy. So I do it."

Dixon laughed.

"You'd do the same thing for Beth, right?"

"Yeah," Dixon said.

"Girls don't want to be treated like shit," Daryl told him. "But they don't want a pussy either."

"Noah's not a pussy."

"Nah, he ain't. Okay, he ain't. But he ain't exactly…he ain't as bad ass as you are. Ain't as skilled. Ain't as competent."

"He's actually really competent about mechanical stuff. He's smart. Like Patrick. And girls like smart, too."

"You're smart."

"I just read a lot." Dixon whistled at Daisy because she got too far astray chasing that butterfly. The dog trotted back.

"How stupid do you think your girlfriend is?" Daryl asked.

"Beth's not stupid!" Dixon exclaimed.

"A'ight, then why the hell you ever think she'd dump you for Noah? And if she does, that's just proof she ain't smart 'nuff for ya."

Dixon shook his head. "Well, that's going to be small consolation if she ever does dump me, but, thanks, Uncle Daryl."

Carol was driving toward them now across the lot in Daryl's pickup. She must have been notified by whoever was on watch that they'd emerged from the forest. She came to a stop before them. Glad to be rid of the heavy turkey, Daryl tossed it in the bed, after Dixon's turkey. Dixon lowered the tail, helped Daisy up, and sat on the tail beside her, while Daryl went and got in the passenger' side of the truck.

As Carol drove toward the gate, he asked, "You don't think I'm a sweet, do you?"

"You're sweet to me, Pookie."

"But I ain't sweet."

"Well, I don't know. I'll have to taste you later." She wiggled an eyebrow at him.

"Stahp."

"You don't want me to?"

"Want ya to. Just meant stahp with the corny jokes."

"You love my corny jokes," Carol insisted as she tapped the accelerator and flew across the rest of the parking lot before bump-bumping up the curb of the sidewalk that led to the gate. She dropped them - and their - turkeys - at the butcher's table and went on to the house.

The hunters hung the turkeys head-up from a wooden hanging apparatus they'd built for working on the animals and severed the outer wing bones at the joint with their knives. "Carl's comin' huntin' with us tomorrow," Daryl told Dixon. "So let 'em take the first shot if we see a deer."

"We doing the blind or tracking?"

"Trackin'. He's still learnin' the sign."

They pulled the larger feathers out with a pair of pliers and set them aside on the butcher's table to begin plucking the rest by hand. By this time, Beth had joined them to help with the plucking. They were half done when Noah stopped by and offered to help.

Dixon said, "I think we've got it covered. Besides, do you even know how to pluck a turkey?"

"It doesn't exactly look like rocket science," Noah replied.

Beth laughed, and Dixon grimaced.

"Let y'all finish this," Daryl said and headed on to the house.

When he got inside, Patrick and Sophia were rolling dough at the counter. Sophia had just flung flour at the young man's face and was laughing as he wiped it off from his cheeks.

"Don't make a mess," Daryl muttered at Patrick.

"I'll clean up later, sir," Patrick replied.

Sir. He'd never been called sir in his life. There was something weird about that kid. But Daryl didn't hate it. Sir. He had a bit of a pep in his step when he walked into the bedroom where Carol was now writing in her journal at the little writing desk in the corner. "Gonna get cleaned up from the hunt. Wanna join me?"

"In the shower? With the kids in the kitchen?" She turned back and smiled at him. "I don't think so."

He shrugged. "Your loss. But I'll be nice in clean for you to taste me when I get out."

Carol smiled again and returned to her writing.