AN: Here we are, another chapter here.
I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think!
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They walked along keeping a steady pace. Without any particular place to go that they would reach by nightfall, there was hardly any reason to use what stores of energy they had on trying to keep up some kind of breakneck speed. They would eventually make it to Virginia, but not within the next few days or even weeks.
Rick walked along, carrying Judith. He tore his eyes, every now and again, from the horizon ahead of them, and glanced over those around him.
Carl tended to walk with Michonne. The two of them, at first glance, would have next to nothing in common, but it turned out that they could talk comic books for hours, and often did. They'd hash and rehash the same arguments with each other. They'd discuss how this issue was better than that one, how this illustrator did it better than other…they'd delve into "if I were directing a movie of this or that" conversations. It was something to pass the time.
And Rick was thankful that Carl had a friend in Michonne.
Ahead of him, Carol walked along not too far from Tyreese. The pair mostly walked in silence, but every now and again, Rick would see Tyreese step slightly to the side, lean toward Carol, and say something. She always responded with a nod or shake of the head and some quick response that he couldn't overhear with the distance.
It just made him think.
It made him think about how he'd watched her over breakfast, stealing looks at her more than anything, and how he'd felt almost like he was doing something illegal…something he wasn't allowed to do. Even if, realistically, he had no reason to believe he wasn't allowed to look at her.
He'd thought about how much he wished he knew what it was that was going on between them. How much he wished they'd had the conversation that they'd put off because neither of them had a solid answer to contribute to it.
He'd thought about how he wished, honestly, that he would have the—was it permission? He wished he had whatever it was that he needed to do something so entirely bold as walk over to her, over their thrown together breakfast, and kiss her. Or, if not even that, to kiss her quickly before they'd started the walk toward wherever the road took them tonight.
He didn't even have the courage, as of yet, to invite himself to walk beside her with the same level of comfort that Tyreese had. Not with everyone watching. Not with people knowing what had happened between them before and, probably, not having the ability to understand what was happening between them now.
Not that they even really seemed to know for sure what was happening.
Daryl had been somewhat looming around Rick. He'd drop back, surge forward, drop back again. His gate had taken on the somewhat loping nature that it had when he was wound up about something.
Rick didn't know, exactly, what he might have to be wound up about, but it was growing more and more evident that there was something there. And it was also somewhat evident that, whatever it was, it had to do with Rick.
Unless, though, it was something of immediate concern in nature, the road wasn't a place for any kind of serious discussion or for any possible conflict. Besides slowing them down, it would disrupt everyone around them, lower the already low morale to something like rock bottom, and it would possibly draw Walkers.
So Rick allowed the man to keep up his frustrated pacing the entire time they walked and resolved, as soon as they found somewhere to pass the night, to arrange things so that they could take watch together.
Even though Rick could think of other things he'd rather do than take watch with Daryl to sort out some problem he wasn't aware of, he knew that solving this was important. He was, first and foremost, the leader—even if he hated the position—and that meant that he had to try to do his best to keep a check on everyone, even if they didn't realize what he was doing or what that might mean he was giving up of his own.
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"Don't need you to keep watch," Daryl said as Rick stepped out onto the wrap around porch of the sizeable farmhouse that they'd chosen for the night.
"You might not need me to keep watch," Rick said, "but you clearly need to talk to me. So—are you ready to tell me what's going on? Is it something I need to be concerned about?"´
Daryl made a sound that Rick could only really describe as something akin to laughter, but it wasn´t the laughter of a good, belly-busting joke.
"You and Carol?" Daryl asked.
Rick closed the distance between them on the porch and took a seat so that he could actually see Daryl well.
He hadn't realized that anyone would know anything about their nighttime escapades, but in hindsight that was probably pretty ignorant thinking on his part. The hotel wasn't sound proof. He'd heard the comings and goings of others. It was only reasonable to assume that they weren't in the only sound proof bubble of the building.
But Rick also didn't know how to respond because he didn't know, at least not for sure, what Daryl's concerns might be.
"What about Carol?" Rick asked.
The same sound. A laugh. An ironic laugh, probably.
"What are you doing?" Daryl asked.
He lit a cigarette and focused on it for a moment. As of yet, he hadn't actually looked at Rick at all during this conversation—or whatever one might choose to call the exchange.
Rick considered his answer for a moment, and before he was able to offer anything to Daryl, Daryl had spoken again, adding to his previous statement.
"You gonna throw her out again? Like garbage? Leave her by the side of the road?" Daryl asked.
Rick was struck.
It wasn't so much that he didn't think the statement was fair. He had lived over and over, in his mind, the moment when he left her in the cul de sac until it was almost clearer to his mind's eye than it had been to his real eyes on the day he'd watched her driving away.
He probably deserved whatever scrutiny he got.
What struck him was that he never really expected Daryl to be the one to call him out on it.
"No," Rick said. "I'm not."
"She don't deserve that," Daryl said, quickly and sharply. He still hadn't looked at Rick in the face.
"She doesn't," Rick agreed. "It's not like that."
The sound came again. The laugher that wasn't really laughter.
"Then what the hell's it like, man?" Daryl asked.
"To be honest?" Rick asked. "I don't know. Not exactly. I just…don't know."
Daryl turned toward him then. It was the first time that Daryl bothered to look directly at Rick. The darkness surrounding them made it difficult to tell anything about his expression. He was too covered over in shadow for Rick to get a clear read.
"You're just fuckin' with her, and you don't even know why…" Daryl commented.
That comment struck Rick too.
It struck him even more because there was some venom behind the words.
"I care about Carol," Rick said.
"You care about her enough to leave her," Daryl said. "Leave her for dead. Don't tell nobody where she is. Don't even give her a fair trial."
Daryl pushed himself up. He was on his feet much more quickly than Rick could have gained his at this point. No matter, though, because he didn't come for Rick in the way that Rick might have imagined he would. He dropped off the porch that they were occupying and started a pacing walk, back and forth, in front of the steps—the same hurried and awkward gate that he'd used on the road earlier, the same one he used whenever he was wound up about something.
Rick gained his feet too, though he didn't leave the porch, just to feel as though they were a little more even.
"I've told her I'm sorry," Rick said. "A dozen times—more than that. She knows I'm sorry."
There was no immediate comment from Daryl, but he didn't stop the nervous pacing either.
"I care about Carol. I—I haven't always made the best decisions. Not for her. Not for anyone," Rick said. "But I care about Carol. She knows that."
"Does she?" Daryl shot back from the darkness that wrapped around him now. "Does she know that? 'Cause she sure didn't seem to know it the whole time I was tryin' to make sure she didn't run off in the middle of the night! She sure didn't know it while I was tryin' to make sure she didn't get herself killed because she figured you ain't wanted her around! Didn't nobody want her around! That's what she thought! And it was you who made her think that…so does she know how much you're supposed to care about her?"
Now he sounded angry. Rick let him finish. He let him rave about whatever it was that was bothering him. That was the only way to get Daryl to calm down in the long run anyway. You just had to let him have his explosion. You had to try to keep it from getting anyone killed, of course, but you had to let him have his explosion—then you could reason with him.
"She deserves better'n that!" Daryl barked at him. "Better'n—"
He stopped abruptly. A little too abruptly. He didn't sound done, exactly.
"Better than what?" Rick pressed.
There was no response. It could be something that Daryl was going to say thought over once more, but regardless, Rick felt like he should push the man to get it out.
"Better than what, Daryl?" Rick asked again. "Better than me?"
"Better than you treated Lori," Daryl said.
Rick felt the impact of the words, but he also knew that they wouldn't have the impact that they had if it weren't for his guilt. And he did have guilt. He had more of it than Daryl knew. More than anyone knew. It was something that he hadn't talked about.
How could he argue that Carol didn't deserve that when he believed that she did? How could he argue that he wasn't the kind of man that would treat her that way when, clearly, he felt like he treated his own wife badly?
"I know," Rick said. It was the only way that he could think to respond to such a statement. "I know. She does. She deserves better than that. And—I'm going to try to give her better than that."
Daryl stopped in his frustration fueled pacing and faced Rick. He didn't say anything, so Rick was left to assume that he was thrown off guard because he'd never prepared for Rick to agree with him the slightest.
Daryl didn't know the guilt that Rick carried around—and he carried a great deal of guilt. It wasn't just for Lori or Carol. He had more guilt, some days, than he thought anyone could really manage.
"Let me ask you something, Daryl?" Rick said.
Something of a hum.
"Why do you care so much?" Rick asked. "About—me? About what happens with Carol? It's clear that it bothers you. Why does it bother you so much?"
"Carol's my friend," Daryl said.
Rick nodded his head to himself.
Yes, that much was clear. Everyone who knew the two of them knew that they were friends. They knew that they were close. They had been ever since Hershel's farm. Ever since Sophia—another overwhelming source of guilt for Rick.
"Is she just your friend?" Rick asked.
There was that laughter again. That laughter that wasn't quite laughter. But Rick was already beginning to learn what the sound meant and to be at least fairly confident that he was correct in interpreting it.
"Daryl-" Rick asked, feeling his own hesitation, but knowing that it was something that he had to ask. He had to know the answer to it. Or, at the very least, he had to know what answer it was that the other man would give him. "Do you…love Carol?"