(Author's notes: Listen to "Wonderland" by Taylor Swift. ❤︎)

…

Quinn, Kingdom

I was dreaming about him. I saw brown eyes. Then I woke up. I was lying on this bed, staring at the ceiling. Like most of the days nowadays. I looked to the window, the sun was about to rise. It will be a sunny day, I could already tell from the sun's rays. My arms were tied to the bed since I threw a glass of water against the wall.

Negan…

I closed my eyes, tight, then I opened them again. How can someone's life just collapse like this? Like we have no control over anything. I felt mad.

I still wanted to die.

Of course, I had nothing in reach to do anything and Carol was guarding me all the time. Why would anything change? Just because I was kept alive, I felt the same way. I was scared and I was heartbroken.

And there she came, Carol, just when I thought about her.

Sun just barely came up, but she was right there stepping through the door.

"Good morning," she said, with a little smile. Does she really think if she smiles that would make me happy? I didn't smile at all, since I woke up here after I almost died.

I nodded slightly, as much as I could while lying on the bed. She came to me and started to untie my arms.

"What?" I asked surprised.

"Doc says you can walk around a little outside. Do you want to?" she asked. I rolled my eyes.

"What's the point?"

"I told you, I don't give up on you and you will get through this. Let's go take a walk."

I sighed, sat up on the bed. My wrist still had a bandage over the cut.

I dressed up for the first time in real clothes. Since I was here, I was tied to the bed in pajamas. This was the first time I was allowed to get up.

"Come on," Carol smiled at me again when I finished dressing up. We headed out. The sun was blinding me, I had to blink a couple of times to get used to it. We were slowly strolling around the Kingdom. People were already tending to the plants. I saw a few men leading horses to the gates, then mounting them and leaving. We were walking without a single word spoken.

"What's the point?" I asked Carol again. She stopped and turned to me.

"You are not without a purpose. You just haven't found it yet. From now on, if anything happens to you, just think about it that it wouldn't have happened if you were already dead. For example, you couldn't taste this strawberry," she held up a huge strawberry in front of me. I took it and took a bite.

"Wow. I stayed alive for a strawberry," I said sarcastically.

"Don't think about it like that."

"Okay, so I traded Negan for a strawberry."

Carol made a facepalm. She sighed angrily.

"You shouldn't think about him. You should try to get over him."

"Sure," I finished eating the strawberry. "If I told you to stop thinking about a pink elephant, you would only think about it more."

"That's why we should avoid the topic at all," she told me, thoughtfully.

I nodded and turned around. I heard a motorcycle. I rolled my eyes. Carol was smiling wildly.

"I was always curious, does Ezekiel know about Daryl?"

She glanced at me.

"What are you talking about? We are just friends."

"Yeah, sure," like I would believe that. We watched Daryl riding through the gates on his motorcycle. "Why didn't you ever get together? Like there was that no-name guy at Alexandria, then Ezekiel… Both seem pointless to me.

"Stop, Quinn," she said seriously. "Not now. We will talk about this later if this can help you think about something else," she sighed. Daryl approached us.

"Hey," he nodded, looking at both of us.

"Hi," Carol smiled and hugged him. I was just standing there awkwardly, didn't know what to say.

"Didn't expect ya to be out here," he said surprised.

"Doc said she can take a walk outside," Carol told him.

"Actually, I came to talk to you," he said staring at me. Carol nodded understandingly.

"Don't leave her alone," Carol told him quietly, but of course, I could hear it. Daryl nodded. "I'll come back later," said Carol, smiling at me, then left. I folded my arms, looked at Daryl. I felt uneasy.

"What do you want?" I asked him. He looked around, there were some people nearby. He nodded his head towards the gates.

"Do you wanna take a walk in the woods?" he asked.

"Me and you in the woods? No, thank you," I said sarcastically, referring to the day when I confessed my love to him in the forest. He nodded understandingly but still started to walk towards the gates. I rolled my eyes, followed him outside. It was actually nice out there. No people, no noise, no Carol.

"So, what do you want?" I asked him again.

"Just talk," he said in his growling voice. We walked for a little while into the woods, then he stopped and turned to me.

"How 're ya?" he asked, looking concerned. I shrugged.

"Like a piece of shit. That's why you came back?" I asked him.

"I…" he took a deep breath. "I am so sorry, about everything, Quinn. I mean it."

We stood there in silence for a couple of minutes. I could see his eyes slip from my eyes to my wrist, I covered it with my other hand. He looked me in the eye again.

"The only thing you need to be sorry about is interfering," I said.

This seemed to be making him angry, but he tried to hold himself back.

"You couldn't have been happy with him. Ya know that. Would always be in fear because of Michonne and Maggie. And he ain't comin' out of jail," he told me.

I don't remember hearing him talking for so long in one take. He always talks the least he could. I tried to take in what he said. I somewhat agreed with him, but my anger wouldn't cease.

"I just… I can't stop being angry just yet. I'm upset," I told him.

"I know. You have all rights to be."

He looked serious, sincere, and guilty, all at the same time. I started to get it.

"Wait… you are doing this because you think I did it because of you?"

"I was one of your problems… and you were banished from Alexandria because of me."

I shook my head while staring at him disbelievingly. Did he really think that?

"You… you can't be serious. This wasn't your fault. I…" I didn't know what to say to make him believe it. "Look… I had a shitty life before the apocalypse, I was already depressed and then everything just became even worse. I felt it was becoming too much. And I know Negan would never come out of the cell. So, I saw no purpose, no aim to go for. I still don't have anything to live for."

He listened very carefully, staring at me the whole time.

"But…"

"There's no but, Daryl," I interrupted him. "You have nothing to do with my suicide attempt. Yeah, I cried a little bit because of you, but that wasn't enough for me to do it. If it were because of you, I would have done it much earlier."

This seemed to make a point to him a bit.

"'re you sure? I mean… I still feel I owe you," he said unsurely.

I bent my head to one side a little.

"I don't have any feelings for you, Daryl. Not anymore. You don't have to feel anything. Not guilt, not owing to me. Nothing. You have nothing to do with this," I hoped this would finally convince him. He seemed to be thinking very hard.

"You're still important," he said in his low voice.

I didn't know what to say to that, so I just nodded.

"Okay, just don't torture yourself. You don't owe me anything," I said finally.

He was so tall, my neck started to hurt looking up at him for so long because I was lying in bed for months. I pressed my neck a little with my palm, looking at the ground to relax it a bit.

"'re you alright?" he asked.

"Yeah, it's just my neck hurts, I was in bed for so long."

I made a couple of movements with my head then I looked at him again. He stepped closer to me and put his hand on my shoulder, squeezing it a little bit.

"What…?" I didn't expect any kind of physical contact from him, it wasn't like him at all. He rested his hand there for a minute, looked me in the eye then took away his hand.

"I don't want you to die," he said.

I sighed. This sincere apology and physical contact made me ease up a little.

"Okay, fine, I won't kill myself again," I said.

He nodded and I saw a little half-smile.

"You wouldn't stop blaming yourself, would you?" I asked him. He didn't answer, just staring at the ground. I continued. "I promise not to kill myself if you promise you stop blaming yourself.

He looked at me again for a couple of minutes, then slowly nodded.

"'kay. 'll try," he said. We heard footsteps, he turned around quickly. It was Carol.

"I thought you were going for a walk behind the walls," she said scoldingly like we were little kids who did something wrong.

"There's nothing here. We were safe," Daryl told her. Carol smiled at him, shook her head a little.

"Alright, now let's go back and have lunch together," she said smiling at both of us. We headed back to the Kingdom. I didn't know how to feel. I never knew what was going on in Daryl's mind, but this time he made everything even more confusing. I decided to leave it there and not think about it anymore.

Also, he made me promise I won't hurt myself again… but what should I do then?

…

(Author's note: Listen to "Everybody hurts" by Avril Lavigne. Thank You for reading! ❤︎)

(PS: Did you catch the huge storm in the latest episode of the show? It lines up with my fanfiction, it made me so happy! I think about it like it was the same night when Quinn had to stay with Negan. ❤)