She felt as if she was having the worst hangover of her life. Her skull was pounding and the light hurt her eyes when she tried to open them. She didn't know where she was until she heard Carol's voice. She was back at camp. She squinted up at the ceiling of her van.
"You're awake." Carol was sitting beside her; she pressed a cold cloth to the throbbing spot on the side of Danni's head.
"We think you've got a concussion. You've been unconscious since yesterday. Sit up sweetie, have some water."
Her gentle voice made Danni feel like crying. "Yes, mom," She said trying to joke. She pulled herself up, the movement sending a shooting pain through her temple. She winced. "Feel like shit, that's for sure."
She took a small sip from the bottle Carol handed her.
"Glenn?"Danni asked almost afraid of the answer.
"He's fine. So are Rick and Daryl."
Relief flooded her. She remembered being in the vacant lot as Rick exchanged words with Guillermo. After hearing the crack of the gunshot, she felt Daryl push her, and the rock smash the side of her head when she hit the ground.
"How did I get here..."
"Daryl." Carol couldn't hide a smile. "He carried you all the way back."
"You're kidding?"
Carol continued to look amused. "He's been checking in on you too."
"Daryl? Dixon?"
"I think he feels responsible."
"For what? He saved my life if I remember right."
She nodded ."For your concussion. He thinks it's his fault that your head hot that rock."
"It's not."
"That's just the kind of man he is." Carol summed up. "You'll never convince him otherwise."
"She's back with us," Carol said when she noticed Rick looking in the side door.
"Good." He sounded genuinely relieved.
"Rick I'm sorry about what happened." Danni apologized. " I wanted to help, to have your back, not become one more person you had to worry about."
"Actually, the shot saved us all trouble. I'm real sorry about you being hurt like this, but that gangster's dumb move got us Glenn back."
"How?"
"There was a lot of blood from your head wound, so G thought his buddy's shot hit you. He panicked. We played along. Actually, Daryl convinced them you were dead and that we'd come back with the rest of our army and take out the whole place. We made the exchange in promise for no retaliation over you."
"It couldn't have been that easy."
"They weren't all that they seemed. They were a lot more like us than you'd think. Killing the dead is one thing, but the living is something else. They get that. So for Miguel, a couple of guns and the promise we wouldn't take revenge for you and we had Glenn."
Before he left, he said, "Danni, I'm glad you're okay. You did right out there."
He ducked his head out and walked away.
"Honey, why don't you let me take that blood soaked shirt from you and wash it. Your pants too." Carol offered.
Danni realized she still had on the clothes she'd worn into Atlanta. Her yellow t-shirt was completely saturated in dried crimson.
"You don't mind? Because I can do it myself later."
"No, let me, you need to rest."
Danni pulled the shirt off over her head.
"Bra too," Carol suggested.
"I'm a mess." She felt uneasy, having Carol acting so motherly toward her.
"This okay?" Carol handed her a thin cotton tank top and some worn blue jeans from a pile of clothes next to the guitar cases stacked by the wheel well of the van.
Danni nodded, a lump in her throat. She put on the clean clothes.
"One more thing," Carol said leaning toward the younger woman. She brushed out Danni's tangled black hair, removing the knots and flakes of dried blood.
"That hurt?" she asked when she got close to the now swollen scabbed wound above Danni's ear."
"Not too bad." Danni suddenly felt tears streaming down her cheeks. Carol's soft voice and affectionate touch were foreign. It was a secret longing, that mother's love and attention she'd lacked all of her life.
"When you're feeling better you can wash that hair of yours," Carol suggested. "Are you sure I'm not hurting you?" She noticed Danni's tears.
Danni shook her head.
"Hey honey, come here." Carol hugged Danni. "You're okay. Shhh."
Danni regained her composure and awkwardly moved out of Carol's embrace. "You are such a mom." She said trying to laugh.
Carol nodded, understanding. "Well, I'll get these back to you soon as I can." She smiled.
Danni's head and entire body ached. When she was alone, she curled up in a fetal position, willing the pain to stop; the pain in her head and the pain in her heart. She slept on and off during the rest of the afternoon. Gradually, she began to feel more like herself.
A few concerned visitors stopped by. Carl and Sophia brought her some wildflowers they had picked. Carl was sure to mention that the flowers were the little girl's idea.
A few hours later, only Glenn remained recounting the events of the stand-off in Atlanta.
"I can't believe how much blood there was." Glenn was telling her. "I thought the bullet hit you. But Daryl didn't freak out. He held you up and Guillermo started yelling at his guys to stand down. It all happened so fast. "
"I'm so glad we got you. Did Daryl actually carry me back here?"
"Yeah, he said it was easy. Just like hauling a dead deer out of the woods on his back. "
"Nice."
They laughed. Danni was feeling better; she still had a headache and her mind seemed a little fuzzy, but her vision was fine.
Glenn's voice became serious. "Rick and Shane are planning a move." He told her. "Rick wants to go to the CDC and find out about this disease or whatever it is. He thinks there may be a cure. Shane wants to head to the army base at Fort Benning in the opposite direction. They're trying to work it out. My vote's with Rick." Glenn said positively. "You?"
"Yeah, team Rick all the way."
... ... .. .. .. .. .. .. ..
Before she took Danni's dirty clothing to wash at the lake, Carol made a stop.
"She's awake, you know." She surprised Daryl.
"What are you talking about?"
"Danni."
Carol saw concern cross his face.
"She's fine."
The tender expression was quickly replaced with his regular scowl.
"You come all the way over here to tell me that?" he asked.
"I just thought you'd want to know."
"Well, I don't. None of my business." He shook his head. "Ya mind? I got things to do here." He motioned to squirrels he was skinning.
"It's okay to care."
"Lady, what are you on about now? Told ya I'm busy."
Carol smiled as he indirectly asked her to leave.
... .. .. .. .. .. .. .
Daryl stealthily walked the perimeter of the camp. Rick wanted someone to patrol every couple of hours. The threat of Walkers migrating out of the city was real.
He was close to the lake where the women were doing laundry. He had no intention of stopping until he heard her name.
"Is that Danni's shirt?" He heard Amy ask Carol.
He hung back, behind a tree listening.
"Yes, just getting the blood out."
"Poor girl," Andrea commented. "But, you know, that's what you get for trying be so tough; running with the boys. What is she trying to prove anyway? "
"Carl started talking about wanting a tattoo. He thinks Danni's are cool. " Lori added."Lord, that'll be the day I let my son mark himself up like that."
"Why would you want them so big?" Amy asked. "And so many. It's not feminine."
"I wonder if she does drugs. Sometimes junkies cover track marks with tattoos." Andrea mused.
"I doubt that." Carol stopped her. "You know, she's a sweet girl. She got hurt trying help Glenn. Risked her life for him. She's been a big help around here."
"Of course she has," Andrea said defensively. "We didn't mean anything by it."
"We don't know her well," Lori explained.
"Do we know anyone well at this point?" Carol asked."She's a little different, that's all."
Figures they talk like that. Regular hen party. Daryl thought, moving on. He knew they had plenty to say about him, too.
These people are wound tighter than bark on a tree. Except maybe Carol. She's the only one whose nose ain't so high up in the air she'd drown if it rained.
... ... ... .. .. .. .. .. .
Danni was glad she could live out of her van. It had always been her home away from home when the band was on the road. She parked at the edge of the camp where the fire pit burned, low, almost out. If she craned her neck around the open side door, she could see the others' tents, now dark, scattered, but all within a safe distance of each other. Everyone else had turned in. She was trying to write while the moon was full enough to offer some light. Her mind was as blank as the page of her Moleskin journal. She'd always been a writer. It was how she made sense of the world. She'd kept a journal since she was a kid and then started writing poems and lyrics. She sighed at her current lack of inspiration. She read her handwriting on the inside cover:
"Shyness is only the effect of a sense of inferiority in some way or other.
If I could persuade myself that my manners were perfectly easy and graceful,
I should not be shy."
-Jane Austen.
Danni collected quotations. She copied down every passage she read or heard that inspired her, or put her feelings into better words than she could imagine.
She listened to the crickets. Tonight they were too loud.
A twig snapped and something rustled in the leaves. She was about to grab a crowbar or tire iron when she saw Daryl approaching. She quickly closed the book and put it down beside her.
"Don't sneak up on me like that!" She tried to keep her voice down, so as not to wake anyone.
"Here," he tossed her a standard orange medication bottle. "Kick ass painkillers. For your head."
"Where..."
"Merle's stash. He left it behind. Got all kinds of stuff. Crystal, speed."
His voice was without its standard gruffness.
"Any Valium?" she asked
"Yeah, I think. Why, you a pill head?"
"No, but I like a Valium with my beer once in a while. What about you?"
"Nah. Never seen the appeal. Watched Merle do too many stupid ass things. More trouble than its worth. Don't even drink all that much. Just to get shit faced if I need to. That surprise you?"
"Should it?"
He shrugged. 'I know those people think I'm a methed out snakebiter. Seen how they look at me."
She caught his use of "those people" and not "you people."
"They probably think I'm a damned junkie." She mused.
"Yeah, well..."
She laughed. "Fuck 'em."
He almost smiled. "You want the Valium or what?"
"No, not really. Out here I'm alert all the time."
"Like they say, alert today, alive tomorrow."
"Who says that?"
"I don't know, somebody."He got flustered for a minute. "Jesus girl, you always give me a hard time."
He stood, chewing the rough skin around his thumbnail. She'd seen him do it before. The silence didn't bother her so much, but she sensed he wanted something.
He studied her long toned arms. Screw what Andrea and her sister said. The tattoos suited Danni. He noticed how perfectly the words Fever Few scrolled around her delicate wrist next to an image of the blue and yellow flower. There were more flowers, words he couldn't make out, a panther, tiger and some kind of virgin mary. The Mexican one, he thought.
Danni noticed him looking at the large portrait of Our Lady of Guadalupe covering the top half of her left arm. "She's the patron saint of the poor. My kind of saint."
He nodded. "Looks like a fuckin' painting. They all do."
"What do you have? On your back, I can see some of it."
"Nothin' worth looking at." He became agitated and pulled at his shirt, trying to cover the black ink on his shoulder. His reaction was extreme, so she didn't push it. She had a feeling there was more than a tattoo marking up his back.
"Daryl, I know you saved my life." She changed the subject, needing to thank him.
He looked more than uncomfortable. He started pacing slowly.
"What you did was fucking dangerous. You might have been killed yourself."
"Yeah, I got good reflexes." He automatically minimized his actions.
"I'm glad you were there; you knew what to do."
Her appreciation and recognition rattled him. As usual, he felt lost for words and kicked at the dirt with the toe of his boot.
"Well thank you. Okay?"
"I gotta go."
She nodded.
Despite what he'd said, he didn't move. He hesitated, then surprised her by pulling himself up into the vehicle to sit across from her.
He was always such a mess. Like a little boy. No one to tell him to wash his hair or change his clothes. He had on his usual attire; dirty, sleeveless flannel shirt, cargo pants, those Red Wings. The shirt's roughly cut sleeves drew her attention to his strong, broad shoulders. She imagined him carrying her. I wish I'd been awake to feel him holding me. He looked up as if he read her mind. Their eyes locked and his piercing blue stare met hers. She swore his eyes had changed. The blue iris darkened with something primitive. She felt the heat between them and she couldn't remove her eyes from his. He suddenly shifted his gaze down.
He made her uneasy. He brought out those damn butterflies in her stomach. But, she didn't want him to leave. She tried to make more conversation.
"I can't believe you carried me back here." She hoped her voice wasn't shaking.
He shrugged. "Nuthin' to it. Me and Merle carried bucks out of the woods all the time. He made me do it. Wouldn't let me quarter the damn animal or nothin'. Had to be whole- Merle said real men carried their kill whole. So I did."
"He was hard on you."
Daryl became defensive. "He wanted me to be a man, not a pussy. That's all. He'd say if you're gonna be stupid you better be tough."
"He called you stupid?"
His eyes darkened and she thought she glimpsed pain for a brief second before they flashed anger. "Don't talk about Merle." His abrupt tone shut her down. Just like that.
She never seemed to say the right thing to him.
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be." He said jumping down from his seat. As he moved off into the woods he called back, "Hope them, pills help your head."
He left her feeling dissatisfied; wanting more. But more of what? He pushed her and then he pulled and she let him.
That look on your face yanks my neck on the chain and I would do anything to see you again.
-Neko Case "Star Witness"