AN: Here we are, another chapter here!
I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think!
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"No. No, thank you, Daddy," Sophia responded to what Daryl felt like was his fiftieth offer to get her out of the tub and dry her off.
"Sophia—I know you like the bathtub," Daryl said.
"I like it!" Sophia declared loudly, grinning at Daryl. He smiled to himself. She looked so much like Carol—her features, her smile, and the way she crinkled her nose with absolute bliss—that it made his whole body feel warm to see her happy. And she was happy. The apartment had two bathrooms. The bathtub was much larger than the little metal washtub where Sophia had taken most of her baths, and the guy at the community storage building had been so happy to see a child—there were so very few children these days, though they all hoped to remedy that—that he'd offered over a large assortment of toys for Sophia. In those toys, she'd found a practical zoo of bathtub-safe animals, and they were all either learning how to swim or lounging around the proverbial watering hole provided for them by the bathtub. She had already made Daryl name, for her, what each animal was at least seven or eight times.
"Sweetheart, your water's gettin' cold," Daryl said. "And your Daddy's gettin' tired."
She furrowed her brows at him.
"You tired?" She asked.
"I'm tired," Daryl confirmed.
"You can sleep, Daddy. You can go sleepy."
Daryl shook his head.
"I can't," he said. "Not until Sophia goes to sleep. I can't leave you in the bathtub all night. You can't even climb out."
"I can climb out," Sophia assured him.
"You can't," Daryl said. "Too high."
"Papa Hershey," Sophia offered. The second greatest thing about the apartment in Sophia's mind, so far, was that Papa Hershel had moved in with them and, unlike the prison, their communal space was much more communal and much less separated by bars and corridors. Sophia liked that Hershel was nearby, at all times, and it was evident that the old man liked it, too. Daryl thought, in the span of an afternoon, he looked younger than he had in ages.
"Papa Hershel's tired," Daryl said. "Done gone to bed. He's sleepin' already. He ain't gonna come rescue you from the bathtub, so it's time to get out."
"No," Sophia begged. "No, thank you, Daddy!"
Daryl sighed. He reached his hand over and touched the water. It was rapidly cooling down.
"You gonna freeze to death," Daryl said. "I think you shiverin' an' your lips is turning purple." Sophia shook her head. She tried to ignore him and to continue playing with her toys. "Tell you what. You can have a bath tomorrow, too, how's that?" Sophia began to rock, from side to side, on her bottom and sing a song with randomly strung together words to the zebra and warthog that appeared to be kissing or headbutting each other. "Come on, Soph—let's get your warm pajamas on, all right?"
She couldn't have been ignoring him any more entirely. It was impossible. She was ignoring him so well that Daryl, had he not known that nothing had happened, might have wondered if he'd disappeared entirely.
"All right," he said. "I'm sorry." He dipped his hand in and moved the rubber cover that kept the water in. It had been a rushed acquirement when they'd realized that the drain leaked when they tried to stop it with its own mechanism.
Sophia was unaccustomed to what a drain meant. Her little metal tub didn't have a drain. It was tipped over and the water spilled out, running down the prison yard or into the drain in the shower rooms. Either way, it did not function the same as this tub, with the slow seeping away of her precious, cold, dirty bathwater.
The drain was grated, and wouldn't allow for any of her new bath toys to be lost in some kind of drain oblivion. Instead, as they floated down toward the drain, they came to rest on top of the drain. It was the slow procession of all her animals to the drain that caught Sophia's attention. She watched it with red, tired eyes and a half-open mouth, looking very much like Carol when she concentrated on something that was new and just a little outside of her realm of knowledge and understanding.
She grew increasingly worried as more of her animals came to land on the tub bottom, and she forgot about splashing in the last remaining puddles as the water slipped away. Daryl let her experience the whole event. He waited, patiently, as she took in everything that was happening and had happened. Then she looked at him, brow furrowed and mouth open.
"Daddy! My bath!"
Daryl bit the inside of his cheek, hard, to try not to laugh at her. This was serious to her. He wanted to handle her personal tragedy with the attention and gravity that it required.
"Bath's over," Daryl said. "Water went down the drain. It's gone now."
She moved her mouth, while she watched his, like she was studying his words. She did that, sometimes, when she was learning new words. He assumed that, maybe, she also did that while learning new concepts. In a whisper, imperceptible beyond the whistle of words, she repeated some part of what he'd said back to herself.
Her eyes were red. Her eyelids were purple. She was tired—too tired. It had been a long day and moving, no matter what anybody thought, was a big deal for someone so small.
"Get it back," Sophia said, her words coming out between a command and a question. There was a profound amount of sadness behind her words, and when she blinked, her eyes hesitated a little to come open.
Daryl smiled at her, as sincerely as he could, and reached his hand out to stroke her face. The simple touch was soothing enough that Sophia closed her eyes. Daryl knew, if he could get her to cooperate, she would be asleep, perhaps, before he'd even gotten her fully tucked into her bed.
"Can't get it back," Daryl said. "Not tonight. But there's gonna be a new bath tomorrow, Sophia. Now, come on. You cold and Daddy's tired. Let's get you dry an' put on your warm pajamas. Then we can get us some lovin'."
Sophia yawned at, apparently, the mere thought of warm pajamas and a little snuggling.
Daryl got up, groaning a little at his body's protests over having been on the floor for so long.
"You OK, Daddy?" Sophia asked, getting to her feet with much more ease and holding onto the side of the tub. Daryl laughed to himself.
"Just fine," Daryl said. "Just gettin' old, Soph. Your Daddy's an old man." Daryl unfolded Sophia's towel. "Hold your arms up," he commanded. She did as he asked, and he wrapped the towel around her. As soon as he pulled her up, out of the tub, he sat a soggy Sophia on the potty that they'd brought from the prison. She knew the drill, but she was sleepy enough that she used the bathroom with her eyes closed and seemed to rely on Daryl to hold her up while she did. She mumbled a "done" at Daryl, and he wiped her before gathering her up, towel and all, and hugging her against him. Immediately, she dropped her head hard against his shoulder. He smiled to himself and rubbed her back. "You done good, goin' potty, Soph. Just like you ought to. Let's get Mama and get ready for bed."
In the living area, Carol was reclined on the couch with a book that she was reading by lamplight. She looked up as Daryl stepped out of the bathroom.
"We're ready?" She asked.
"When you are," Daryl said.
Carol got up and led the way to Sophia's little bedroom. They'd put it together in sort of a hurry, but the girl didn't have too much in the way of possessions. They'd gotten her a big girl bed, but they'd kept her pen. She'd sleep in her pen tonight, so there wasn't too much newness in her life at one time, and then they'd start transitioning her to the big bed as she settled in. They'd gotten her a dresser to hold her clothes, and they'd gotten a large box that was serving as a toybox, though Daryl didn't know what it had once been. It was some kind of crate and, if he could acquire some paint, he intended to paint it for Sophia. They also got a rocking chair, and they full intended to have one in each of the extra bedrooms—since, eventually, they'd begin to convert the empty bedroom into a nursery for the barely-there little one that Carol carried.
Daryl swayed his body, rocking Sophia, while he waited for Carol to get the diaper, pajamas, and lotion that she wanted. Sophia, with her head leaned against Daryl's shoulder, hummed at him from time to time and fell silent the rest of the time. She was fading fast, and he knew that.
Daryl put her on the bed, where Carol indicated, and Carol kissed her face and accepted the hug that Sophia reached up to give her. She leaned on her knee on the bed, for a moment, and remained in the stooped position that Sophia demanded to get the affection that she wanted from her mother. When Sophia was satisfied with her hug, she released Carol and allowed her mother to slather her down with the sweet-smelling lotion while quietly talking to her.
Daryl liked to listen when Carol would talk to Sophia during these types of simple, daily activities. These quiet conversations—whispered words from Carol to Sophia—weren't like the normal little chats that they had throughout the day. During these times, when Sophia was quiet and almost asleep, Carol would sometimes quietly narrate what she was doing. "We're going to put your little ducky pajamas on. You like the duckies and they'll be warm—so warm, my baby—while you sleep." Other times, she whispered quiet little confirmations to the girl. "Mama love you so much. You're such a special little girl, Sophia. You're so sweet, and everybody loves you. You're so smart, Sophia."
It didn't matter, exactly, what she said to the girl. The quiet message remained the same, no matter the words: Sophia was loved, dearly, and she was important enough to be treated with respect and kindness. Sometimes, hearing Carol murmur to the girl in that way, it reminded Daryl that Sophia might have been unlucky enough to grow up around someone who would treat her with very little respect, and very much like she was little more than an unwanted animal.
It hurt Daryl, too, to realize that Carol thought that nurturing her daughter the way she did, and being sure to build her up as much as she could, was likely a response to having lived much of her life being torn down and wanting to make sure that her daughter never experienced that. Daryl understood that, on a personal level, and it was one of the reasons that he was careful in his interactions with his daughter, but it also made his chest ache to simply remember that there was once a man who didn't know how Carol should be treated, and so he'd mistreated her for years.
When Sophia was slathered in lotion, and tucked lovingly into her pajamas, Carol had kissed her on the forehead and picked her up to hug her close to her, much like she used to do when she'd been an infant. Sophia hugged her back and made a sleepy request for "milk," though it was evident to Daryl that Carol would no sooner get situated with her before she'd be asleep. Still, Carol didn't argue. She carried Sophia over and settled into the rocking chair.
"I'll snuggle with her a few minutes after she gets some milk if you wanna take a bath. That chair sit OK?" Daryl asked, keeping his voice low, and watching as Carol got Sophia comfortable to nurse.
"Perfect," Carol said. "We hardly fit, though. Sophia's getting so big."
"Uh uh," Sophia whined, not bothering to spit out the nipple she'd acquired. She was clearly not ready to "get big" at this moment. Daryl's heart fluttered in his chest. Sometimes, Sophia wanted to be a "big girl" and it seemed like she was just a day or two away from being grown at the rate she wanted to mature. Other days, she seemed to crave her babyhood, and she had special requests for snuggles and play that reminded him of when she'd been much smaller.
Whether it was right or wrong, Daryl indulged her either way. He knew that the day would come when she simply couldn't be mistaken for a baby any longer. Even the softness of her toddlerhood would disappear. He knew the day would come, too, when she wouldn't want to have moments of being loved like a baby by her parents. Still, he couldn't say that he wouldn't, if she asked him, gather her into his arms, even then, to hug her close to him and tell her a story about something ridiculous like the difference between prison gnomes and forest gnomes, just because, for whatever reason, she needed that time with him.
Daryl didn't remember having much of a childhood. He couldn't recall many of those hugs and indulgences. But he could remember, very distinctly, times when his requests for such things had been outright refused or, being somewhat impossible, he'd been sent to get whatever affection he could from a big brother who, denied a childhood of his own even more so than Daryl had been, would do his best to convince his baby brother that there was still some goodness in the world somewhere.
Daryl wanted to be sure that Sophia had every bit of childhood magic that she could possibly get from life.
He walked over and stroked the little girl's hair while she half-nursed at her mother's breast.
"She's still little," he offered quietly. Sophia hummed in agreement, her eyes dancing behind her eyelids. Daryl smiled at the soft expression that crossed Carol's lips as she regarded her daughter with the purest love possible. "And we gonna let her be little for a while longer, at least. For as long as she needs it."