AN: Here we go, another chapter here.
Warnings on this one for discussion of abortion, miscarriage, and domestic abuse. Nothing too graphic, but it's more than alluded to.
I hope that you enjoy! Let me know what you think!
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Daryl didn't approach Carol, or directly ask her what was wrong, until their supper was finished, Merle was gone back to the Greene farm, and Carol had started cleaning up—in their brand new kitchen—while water heated on the wood burning stove for their baths.
He didn't have to know exactly what was wrong to know that there was something wrong. And he could accept that maybe she needed some time to think about it—or stew over it—or to do whatever it was that she seemed to need to do. Night was on them, though, and Daryl thought it was time to address things before they retired.
Daryl sat in the chair that Merle had used while they'd eaten supper. Daryl had sat on a wooden box for the meal since they weren't in the practice of having company and didn't yet have enough chairs to go around. Merle, as was customary, hadn't bothered to put his chair back, so Daryl didn't have to bother pulling it out to sit in it. From where he sat—the house almost bare—he had a clear view of Carol as she washed dishes at the basin she filled for just such a task.
"You gonna tell me what the hell you sore about?" Daryl asked.
Carol paused in her washing for just a second and then she picked it back up again.
"I'm not sore, Daryl," Carol said. "I seem to remember that I told you that in town."
"Was the last damn thing you told me," Daryl said. "Was the last damn thing you said to anybody 'cept that supper was ready. Didn't speak to Merle—and don't'cha think he ain't noticed. Didn't say nothin' to me 'bout what you was thinkin'. 'Bout where we oughta put nothin'."
Carol looked around her. There wasn't much that they had to move from the little cabin, but they'd moved everything there was.
"I think it's all fine, Daryl," Carol said. "If it makes you happy."
"It weren't me I was movin' it for," Daryl said. "Carol—I spent my whole damn life back in Georgia in a house that weren't no damn bigger'n the one we just moved outta. When my old man was gone, they was a lil' more room. Helluva lot more air. When my Ma was gone? Too damn much room for Merle'n me. Spent the next part a' my life on wagons. Sometimes drivin' 'em. Sometimes ridin' in the back. Some damn times walkin' along behind 'em. After that? Spent part of my life livin' in a hayloft with Merle while we worked off what we owed from the comin' west. And then? Slept in Hershel's attic with Merle. Lil' room they made for us among the stuff that's up there. Stuff they prob'ly don't even know they got. Don't know they ever had. Weren't me I built this house for. Weren't me I moved in it for. Ain't me that gives a damn where the hell the furniture goes or if we even got furniture."
"It's all for me," Carol said. She dried her hands and busied herself straightening up things that she'd already straightened.
"That's right," Daryl said. "You right. Ever' bit of it. All for you, Carol. Built this house for you."
"I thought you built it for us," Carol said.
"But you don't seem to be too happy here," Daryl said. "An' if you ain't here? They ain't no us."
Daryl swallowed. The sharp feeling that surged through his chest at his own words would've made him sure that somebody had shot him if he didn't know that there was nobody there except him and Carol.
Carol dropped her head where she stood.
"I haven't left," Carol said.
"But you ain't exactly been here," Daryl said.
"I haven't been anywhere else," Carol said. "Except to town. But you were with me."
"Tell me why you're sore," Daryl said. "Gimme—at least gimme a chance, Carol, to make it right. Tell me what I done so I can fix it. If it can be fixed."
"You didn't do anything, Daryl," Carol said.
"Then why ain't you talkin' to me? Why you just lookin' the other way when I'm talkin' to you?" Daryl asked.
Carol shook her head and Daryl heard her sharp intake of breath across the distance the separated them.
"I saw how you looked at that woman in town today," Carol said.
"What woman?" Daryl asked.
Carol shrugged her shoulders.
"Was it Emma?" Carol asked.
"You the one what knows what'cha talkin' about," Daryl said. "I don't got no idea."
"At the hardware," Carol said. "The woman. With the boy? The husband?"
Daryl shrugged his own shoulders now and sat forward in his chair, resting his elbows on his legs.
"I 'member her," Daryl said. "But—I don't know what'cha diggin' at."
"I saw how you looked at her," Carol said.
"I weren't lookin' at her," Daryl said, his stomach twisting a little with the accusation. He couldn't recall having looked at the woman any particular way, but apparently Carol had seen something that he hadn't. He only saw, after all, out of his eyes—he didn't see his face real regularly unless it was in a glass somewhere. And even then, he'd barely done it enough to draw to memory what he even looked like.
"When she said—when she said she was expectin' a child?" Carol said. She shook her head. "You looked at her so hard. Like—she was somethin' like you ain't never seen before."
Daryl shrugged his shoulders at her.
"She was somethin' like I ain't never seen before," Daryl ceded. "Said she was pregnant, but I didn't see no kid on her." He shrugged his shoulders again. "Ain't seen a whole lotta women in my life that was set to have young'uns—but the ones I have seen? They was way on heavier than she was."
"It don't happen overnight, Daryl," Carol said. "She don't wake up, knowin' she's carryin' a child, and already she's set to drop it. Don't happen overnight. Just like it don't with the cows."
"Reckon I know that," Daryl said. "But it's one thing to know it. Somethin' else to see it. That's what'cha sore about? I looked at the woman?" Carol went back to pretending to do things—moving around things that had no reason to be moved around. Then she walked over to the stove and moved the pot of water from where it was warming.
"Come get your bath," Carol said.
"No," Daryl said. Carol turned around to look at him, briefly, like she couldn't believe that he'd said it. He wasn't sure, but he thought that might have been the first time that Carol had looked directly at him since they'd been in town. He shook his head at her. "No," he repeated. "You ain't gonna tell me you sore at me for somethin' I ain't even had no way of knowin' would make you sore an' then tell me I gotta bathe so's you can shut me up an' send me to bed. Not if you ain't tellin' me how the hell to make you so you ain't sore no more. Sit down, Carol."
"I don't want to sit, Daryl," Carol said.
"Yeah," Daryl responded, "but this time I ain't asked you what you want. You my wife. I'm tellin' you to sit down. I ain't askin'. Not this time."
Daryl felt an odd sensation in his body. It was almost like an itch that started at his spine and spread through him. But it was an inside itch. The kind that he couldn't scratch and nobody could scratch for him. It made him uncomfortable and his stomach twisted in response to it, but he didn't retract his statement. He didn't order Carol to do much—he never had to because she was always so willing to do everything he wanted. He wasn't used to having to set his face in the way that let her know that he wasn't joshing her.
He couldn't say that her expression changed. She'd looked just about ready to part company with her supper since she'd looked like she was choking on it while she ate it. She still looked sick. Sick and sad. And Daryl knew, good and well, that he couldn't sleep knowing that she was up looking so sick and so sad and he'd been the one to cause it.
But she nodded her head at him and with heavy feet she walked to the table. She pulled the chair out slowly and she sat down like it was a difficult task to complete.
"The water'll get cold," Carol said.
"Then we'll warm it up again," Daryl said. "What the hell I bought a stove for if it ain't for warmin' shit up?"
"Shouldn't waste wood," Carol said.
"Just means I gotta chop more," Daryl said. "Hell—I can walk five feet out there'n them woods and pick up enough that's fell for that stove to burn from Sunday to Sunday."
"It's just more work for you," Carol said.
"When you gonna stop bein' sore?" Daryl asked.
"I told you," Carol said, keeping pretty strong eye contact with the floor. "I'm not sore, Daryl. Not with you."
Daryl's heart caught. Those were new words. They were a new way of thinking about the whole thing. It was possible for Carol to be sore with someone—but it didn't always have to be Daryl. And it was a perfectly logical thought, but Daryl had gotten to the point of thinking that everything they did or experienced was somehow tied up with each other.
"Who made you sore?" Daryl asked. "Who done it?"
"Me," Carol said, still keeping company with the floor. "You oughta—Daryl—you can deny me. You oughta deny me. I could understand it. Anybody would. You could take you another wife. Like the man at the hardware said—give her all this? An' you could have any wife you wanted, Daryl."
Daryl's gut reacted to Carol's words before anything else in his body caught up with it. Suddenly he realized that supper wasn't going to sit well tonight. He swallowed against the sensation.
"Got me the one I wanted," Daryl said. "I got no cause to deny you. I got no want to, neither."
"But you should," Carol said. "And—all I ask is that you take me back to Eden. Take me back to Andrea?"
"You wantin' you another husband?" Daryl asked, almost afraid of Carol's response.
Carol shook her head at him.
"There won't be no other husband for me, Daryl," Carol said.
"An' they ain't no other wife for me!" Daryl said. He felt, then, the anger starting to rise up in him. He felt the heat of it starting in his belly where his ill-settling supper resided. "You gonna spit out what'cha gotta say right this minute. So help me, Carol, I said I weren't never gonna lay a hand on you. But'cha don't spit this shit out? Tell me why you wantin' to deny me. I'ma get it outta you."
Carol broke her staring at the floorboards and looked at Daryl. The threat he'd made was empty. He felt it was empty. He knew he wouldn't have the heart to go through with it—especially not now that the heart he did have felt like it was cracking right in two. But he didn't want her to know that. He expected her to look afraid, though, when she brought her face to meet his. He didn't expect that her eyes would be welled up with tears and her cheeks would be red from the effort of holding back more of the water.
She shook her head at him.
"You want children," Carol said.
"We both do," Daryl said. "Hell—at least that's what the hell you told me you wanted. You been lyin' to me? All this time?"
Carol shook her head again. Her voice, when she spoke, sounded strained and her words were broken up with quick silences that covered over an excessive amount of swallowing. She looked like she was drowning in her own words. Like she was choking on them just as sure as if she'd fallen face first into them and couldn't get back out again.
"You want children. And you oughta have—a wife that'll bear you children. All you want," Carol choked out.
Daryl sat forward in his own chair, dizziness somewhat shaking his brain for a second.
"You sayin' you don't wanna bear my young'uns?" Daryl asked.
"I want—Daryl? There's nothin' else in the world I want more," Carol said. "I'm sayin'—I don't know if I can."
Daryl had once been in a fight that had started in a saloon with Merle running his mouth. The fight had been taken outside under warning that the sheriff would be called in to deal with it, and in the street they'd locked up with the man that Merle had been bad-mouthing and his buddy. Daryl had fought because necessity had called for it. He'd fought because his brother was going to get his neck broke if they weren't fighting it together. Daryl couldn't recall any of the details about the fight though—what had gotten it started other than cheap whisky and his brother's mouth—except for the fact that he'd gotten gut punched so hard it had made it his eyes go dark for a second.
That same sensation hit Daryl again—though without the aid of the asshole's fists—when he saw Carol's face contort at the words. He wanted to say something, but his mouth wasn't in line with working when his stomach felt so bad. He barely managed to even shake his head at her and get out something that was little more than a gasp of air that was meant to ask for more information.
And, somehow, Carol must've understood it. Or else she had an overwhelming need to unburden herself, because she kept going, her words flowing out with her tears.
"I don't know if I can. I don't know if I ever could. If I was ever meant for it or if—I weren't never meant to be no good wife, Daryl. At Andrea's? Daryl—the doc—he would come 'round and he'd ask everyone about their moons when he was checkin' us. Sometimes he'd give us this—he'd give us—to drink. And I drank it. Right along with everybody else, Daryl. Right along with 'em because they was—they needed to drink it. But I never felt like I needed to. Not like I really needed to. But they needed to and I needed to need to...Daryl. Do you understand? And sometimes they'd let it go too far. Let it set in too good. An' the doc, he'd come around and he'd take care of it and Andrea—she'd dose them with laudanum 'cause of the pain and she'd tend to 'em—and I never so much as tasted the laudanum 'cause there weren't never no pain for me. Not like they was suffering. And I don't know if it was 'cause there was never no child for me to be rid of or if it was...somethin' else. I just—don't know. There was only one time that I was thinkin'—just the one time."
She broke to catch her breath. She broke to swallow down big gulps of air like she'd just run from one end of the world to the other without stopping. She swallowed air like she wasn't getting enough—like she might never get enough again.
Daryl took advantage of her choking silence.
"The one time when?" Daryl asked. "When was they a one time?"
Carol shook her head at him. She continued to shake it even as she continued to swallow down air like a fish caught out of water that was desperately trying to fling itself back for another chance at life.
"I weren't never fit to be no wife," Carol said. "Never. I woudln'ta been at Eden if I was fit to be a wife, Daryl."
"You my wife!" Daryl barked, surprised at how loud his words came out.
"I weren't always!" Carol yelled back. Daryl was more surprised by that than he was by his own reaction. Carol's shoulders immediately sunk. "I weren't always your wife 'cause I was somebody else's wife."
The gut punch feeling returned, but the initial blow was out of the way and now it was just the dull throbbing of an injury sustained.
"What'cha mean?" Daryl asked. "You married? To somebody else?"
Carol shook her head.
"Not no more," Carol said. "Not no more. I'm just married to you, Daryl. But—I was married. He's dead. He was prospectin'. Same as the man in town. He wanted gold. Wanted me to be his wife. Wanted a home, Daryl. Children. An' I weren't never fit to be his wife. Weren't long after we was married he let me know. Let me know I weren't fit to be no wife. Daryl—I can't do all the things that a wife's supposed to do. I couldn't do nothin' to make him happy. An' he tried to teach me how to be the right kinda woman for him. He would hit me if I weren't doin' somethin' right until I got it right—but I never got it right, Daryl."
Daryl couldn't believe what he was hearing. He didn't know how to respond to it. It was too much at once, it felt like, for his brain to even handle. His mind felt like it was spinning around and it couldn't stop. It couldn't focus on any one thing Carol was saying because it was jumping back and forth and trying to understand the whole of it at once.
"I was expectin' a child. At least—I thought I was," Carol said. As she spoke, her voice slowly changed. It seemed to calm a little. The hiccupping breaks that had dotted her words, before, slowly subsided. "I was so happy. I was doin' somethin' right. I might notta been doing anything else right, but I was doin' somethin' right. And then? There just weren't no baby, Daryl. My moons come on me again. Ed, my then-husband, was so mad—he couldn't even stand to hardly look at me. Punished me for it. For not bein' able to do the simplest thing. Don't take nothin', he said, for a woman to bear kids. So simple—even the dullest animal can do it. But I couldn't. That was when he brought me here—travelled just to bring me here. Left me in town. Denied me there. Wasn't nobody that could help me. Except Andrea." Carol looked at Daryl and shook her head. "I hated him, Daryl. Wanted him dead. Said it more'n once. But I didn't know he'd died. Didn't know that—well, Andrea told me he was dead. Had an accident. Got his head stove in. But I wanted him dead more'n once. But I thought—when you married me? I didn't know if it was my hate what had brought on my moons. Maybe I was just so full up of it that there weren't room for nothin' else to grow inside me. When we got married? I thought that—if I was lovin' you? 'Cause I love you, Daryl. Like I ain't never loved nobody. Thought if I was lovin' you—maybe God'd see fit to let me grow your children in that love. But I don't know that it'll happen."
"It just ain't happened yet," Daryl said. In his chest, the ache had changed. Now, instead of the pounding and dull reminder of an injury suffered in the past, there was a strange and radiating numbness that seemed to pulse out to his fingers. He couldn't be mad because his body seemed to have forgotten what that felt like. It seemed to have forgotten how to make the feeling entirely. He felt empty. With no more distance between them than the table that he built, he felt like Carol was far away from him and he felt empty without her. He only wanted to get closer to her. He wanted the distance of the table to be gone. He moved his chair forward a little, nearly pressing himself against the table to shorten the distance between them. "It just ain't happened, Carol."
"What if it don't?" Carol asked. Her whole body sagged. Something invisible was hanging around her neck and dragging her toward the floor.
Once, Daryl had never thought about the possibility of having a child. He'd never thought about the possibility of being married and having anything at all in the world to call his. Once he'd married Carol, though, he'd started thinking of everything he might have. He'd started thinking that everything good in the world was possible for him because Carol had brought it into his life. And once he'd started thinking of having children with her, he couldn't imagine it any different.
"It's gotta," Daryl said. "Gonna happen. Just—ain't happened yet."
"You oughta deny me," Carol said. "Take me back to Eden. Get you a wife what can give you what'cha want, Daryl."
Daryl swallowed and shook his head at her.
"Done got it," Daryl said. "Ain't no wife what can give me what I want but you. You the only damn thing I ever really wanted bad enough to try to get it."
"What if I can't give you no children?" Carol asked.
"I ain't ready to think on that," Daryl said.
"I think it's time to think on it," Carol said. "If you'da married that woman in town? You'd prob'ly be holdin' your son by now. Maybe she'd even be tellin' you that she was carryin' you another. Right here while you was waitin' on her to get your bath ready. His bath ready. Instead? I haven't give you nothing."
"You give me all I ever asked of you," Daryl responded. "It's her what ain't give me nothin'. She ain't even real. Not to me."
"There might not never be a child," Carol said. Her face was still drawn up in places, but she looked less drawn up than she was. Her eyes and cheeks were red, and her face was wet, but the wetness wasn't actively renewing itself.
"That gold I got out there? Growin' in the ground? It's reliable Carol. I know it is. Long as I keep sweatin' over it, it'll keep growin'. You an' me will keep on makin' the money we gotta have to keep on livin'. Long as I'm willin' to keep on sweatin'. Better'n some hole in a rock what offers fast money until they just ain't no more," Daryl said.
"I know that," Carol said.
"We ain't gonna hurt for money," Daryl said. "'Cause I ain't never been afraid to sweat."
"I know," Carol said.
Daryl shrugged his shoulders.
"If I go back to Eden? Won't be to take you back, Carol. An' it won't be in search out no new wife. I go back there? Be offerin' some of that money to one of them whores what's drinkin' down that shit. A whole damn handful of it. Kinda money that's got 'em damn near salivatin' like Andrea was when I was countin' it out to her. An' all they gotta do? Grow one of them kids all the way. Hand him out the back door to ya. Ain't nobody gotta know, Carol. There ain't shit been made that money can't buy." Daryl said. "If that's what'cha wantin'. If that's—gonna make you stop bein' sore? I'll ride out there myself, tomorrow, like I know what the hell we forgot to get in town. What we meant to be gettin'."
"You would do that?" Carol asked.
"If it's what'cha want," Daryl said.
"You can't buy a baby," Carol said.
"Then you don't know shit," Daryl said. "Can buy whatever the hell you want. Ain't Andrea never teached you that? All them books you read an' they ain't never teached you that? Don't believe there's nothin' you can't buy except—maybe somebody lovin' you. An' I love you. You said you love me."
"I do," Carol interjected quickly.
"Then I don't need nothin' else that I can't buy," Daryl said.
"People would know," Carol said.
"Then let 'em know," Daryl said. "Don't make no nevermind to me."
"They would talk," Carol said.
"Do that anyway," Daryl offered.
"Is that what you want, Daryl?" Carol asked.
Daryl shook his head.
"Ain't about what I want," Daryl said. "Ain't been for a while. I got me what I want. Askin' if that's what you want."
Carol shook her head.
"No," Carol said. "That's not what I want. I want—I want to be a mother. I want you to be a father. I wanna bear your children."
Daryl swallowed and nodded his head.
"Then that's what'cha gonna do," Daryl said.
"What if I don't?" Carol asked.
Daryl sucked in a breath and held it. Suddenly he wondered if the slightly dizzy sensation that was whirling his brain about was coming from the fact that they just seemed to be coming back around to the same old thing over and over again.
"All this time you ain't even said what if you do," Daryl responded. "Ain't even considered it."
"Then I'd be happy," Carol said. "If I was to have a child? Then I'd be happy."
Daryl nodded his head.
"Then that's what we gonna do," he said.
"It don't work that way," Carol said.
"Don't work this way neither," Daryl pointed out. "You shakin' like you freezin' to death. An' that ain't workin'. So we gonna do it my way. Just—knowin' that it'll happen. One damn way or another? It'll happen—even if I gotta buy us one. But I ain't gonna do that. Not if it ain't what'cha want. I want'cha to have what'cha want."
"And if I don't want that? And it don't happen?" Carol asked.
Daryl stood up. He crossed the kitchen and put another stick of wood in the stove. Waving his hand over the top, he could feel the heat radiating off of it and he put the pot back in place.
"Then it don't happen," Daryl said.
"You need children," Carol said.
"Got what the hell I need," Daryl said. "Reckon I know what the hell I need. You shakin'. Ain't that damn cold—but you shakin'. Come on over here. I'ma get this water hot. Get'cha warmed up like you oughta be. Couldn't carry no baby no way, shakin' like that. You'da done shook it loose. Maybe that's what'cha done already. But I'ma stop it now. Come here—get warm."