AN: Just a little tidbit, mostly written over coffee this morning, for you all. Depending on the rest of the day, I may have something out later. Hope you're having a lovely day.

Enjoy and as always your reviews are appreciated and loved!

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Daryl sat in the doctor's office and really wasn't sure what to do to pass the time. They'd gotten up early. Carol had obviously not even slept as much as he had and she was quiet pretty much the whole morning. She didn't feel well at all when she got up so Daryl had let Lincoln outside so he'd leave her alone and gotten himself dressed, asking her more than once if she wanted him to do anything. She'd eventually given up trying to be sick, though, declaring that she was fine.

Daryl didn't think she looked fine at all. She was pale, and there were dark circles under her eyes that were evidence of her lack of sleep. She made breakfast while he called Hershel. The old man didn't mind at all that Daryl wasn't coming in to work because of the doctor's appointment and told him that there really wasn't much going on anyway and Daryl didn't need to make the day up over the weekend unless he really needed the hours. Daryl figured he could get back to him on that. They hadn't exactly gotten around to discussing their financial situation in any great detail and this morning just didn't seem like the time to bring anything up.

This morning's breakfast had been pretty much the longest one in the history of the world. They had a lot of time to kill and not a lot of stuff to make it pass, especially since Carol just looked like she'd rather sleep at the kitchen table than do anything else.

When they'd finally gotten to the doctor's office, Daryl had sat with Carol in one of the chairs in the waiting room until they'd called her back. She wasn't really talking, so he just told her he'd be waiting there and watched as one of the nurses, one with a nice face…so he didn't suspect that she was the nurse he didn't like who thought that Carol wasn't sick…took her away.

And now there was a lot of time to kill. Daryl didn't know how long it was supposed to take, that hadn't been exactly explained, but he knew from the clock on the wall that it had already been at least thirty minutes and there was only so much to stare at in the doctor's office.

Like most places in Sweet Junction, the doctor's office wasn't a really huge affair. It was just a general office. The people in the place were a mixed bag of people and Daryl assumed that if he'd lived there and knew the residents of the town better than he did, he could probably put a name and a story to everyone in the room. There was a woman sitting in one corner that had a little boy curled up in her lap. At first glance Daryl could tell it was the kid who was sick because he only wanted to sit in her lap and try to sleep against her chest. Daryl figured that most kids his size wouldn't be trying to sleep all day in their mama's lap if they didn't feel bad.

There was an elderly couple there as well. Daryl watched them for a bit. The man disappeared with one of the nurses after a little while, though, and the old woman took some yarn out of her bag and started making something, obviously trying to pass the time like Daryl was attempting to do. He watched her for a little while, but then her repetitive actions with the yarn started to make him sleepy.

At intervals Daryl glanced at the clock and at other times he watched the hustle and bustle of people that passed in and out of the waiting room. Some went back after Carol and were back and leaving before her. Daryl didn't know if that was normal or not.

Finally he got up and crossed the room to a small bookshelf that was there and loaded down with magazines. He flipped through them but there wasn't really much that he wanted to read. There were some with old people on the front and he didn't have much interest in that, but most of the others looked more like magazines that would interest Carol than him. There were crafty ones and baby ones…he finally settled on one that was a book of puzzles instead of a magazine for reading.

He sat down with the book and realized most of the puzzles were done, but there were a few that weren't done and he'd go crazy if he didn't do something to kill some time. Daryl didn't have anything to write with, so he finally approached the desk.

"May I help you?" The woman behind the desk asked, smiling. Daryl smiled back at her.

"Uh…ya got a pen or a pencil or somethin'?" Daryl asked.

"Sure," the woman said. She produced a pen and Daryl took it, thanking her quickly. He hesitated for a moment, but she'd been one of the few people that he'd seen in there that looked nice and not just exhausted.

"Um…can I ask about somebody?" Daryl asked.

The woman looked at him and wrinkled her brow a bit. She nodded.

"I'll tell you what I can," the woman said. She smiled slightly. Daryl nodded in response.

"Carol went back a good bit ago and I ain't seen nothin', is she s'posed ta still be back there?" Daryl asked.

He was trying to figure out if he should go ahead and start worrying about how he was supposed to be supportive or if there was still a chance that everything was OK.

"Carol?" The woman asked.

For a fleeting second it worried Daryl that the woman didn't know what he was talking about, but he figured then that she probably wasn't as tuned into his problems as he was.

"Carol Peletier," Daryl said.

A look flashed across the woman's face for a moment and then she glanced at something on the computer in front of her. After a second she smiled again, the same warm one she was wearing when he asked her about the pen in his hand.

"Carol McAlister," the woman said. Daryl hadn't really spent a whole lot of time thinking about Carol's last name, but he assumed that McAlister was more than likely her name before she married Ed, and now that she wasn't married, it must be her name again. He turned it over in his mind a couple of times while the woman looked at her computer screen. Daryl wanted to make sure he remembered the last name in case he needed to use it again. "She's in with Dr. Stephens," the woman said.

That didn't do a thing for Daryl. He knew she was in with the doctor…that was the whole reason he was here with her and the whole reason that he was in the waiting room thinking about doing puzzles in an almost spent book.

"Is she OK?" Daryl asked.

The woman smiled and shook her head a little.

"I don't know any of that information, sir. All I can tell you is that she's in with the doctor," she said.

Daryl nodded his head a little and thanked her. He went and sat down again. He glanced at the clock again, but he'd already forgotten now what time they asked her to go with them. He glanced around at a few more faces that had appeared in the waiting room and shifted in his seat a little. He couldn't help but that think that this office seemed like the busiest place he'd been to in the whole town. Apparently there wasn't much to do around here that was more exciting than getting sick.

Daryl sat back in the uncomfortable chair and opened the book up to a word search puzzle that wasn't done. He was pretty good at those kinds of puzzles, and he had time to kill, so he let himself get lost in searching for the list of words they provided. He liked those puzzles since they gave him the words, and even if he didn't know what some of them meant, he could still find them in the block of letters given enough patience.

Daryl was so focused on the puzzle that he jumped when someone touched him on the shoulder.

"Daryl Dixon?" The nurse asked. It was the same nurse that had taken Carol back earlier.

"Yeah," he stammered, still regaining himself from being caught offguard. The woman smiled.

"Carol would like you to come back," the woman said. Daryl got to his feet quickly and left the book and pen in his chair. He realized his heart was pounding. He thought the nurse could probably hear it if she was listening for it.

"She OK?" Daryl asked, following the nurse back down a labyrinth of little hallways, the stinging smell of disinfectant burning his nose.

The nurse turned back to him and smiled warmly. He liked this nurse, whichever one she was.

"She's just fine," the woman said. "Just a little shaky and we thought you might should help her out to the car. She's ready to go when she's dressed. You just need to take her by the desk. All her information is up there."

Daryl didn't have time to ask the nurse anything else. She opened the door to a room and smiled at him again, squeezing the top of his arm before she turned around and slipped back into the small labyrinth surrounding them.

Daryl took a second to get his breath and tried to get his mind ready. He wasn't sure what he was supposed to do or what he was supposed to say, but he was going to give it the best shot he had.

When he walked in the door, Carol was sitting on the same kind of standard exam table he'd seen in every other doctor's office in his life. She was clutching the edge of it, still wearing one of the gowns that tie in the back that Daryl assumed every medical facility in the world must buy in bulk. She wasn't looking at him the moment he walked in, but her facial expression was similar to the one she'd been wearing that morning while she'd insisted that she really wasn't going to throw up.

Daryl could only assume that things were not what she expected them to be. He walked into the room, hoping that hugs really could solve this problem. Carol looked up at him when he walked in, her mouth open again. She looked like she was having trouble breathing. He crossed quickly and she wrapped her arms around him, squeezing, her face leaning into his chest.

"It's OK," he said, rubbing her back. He knew he was going to have to get her to put her clothes on and everything, but he figured for at least a minute he could he try the supportive thing here. He was a little disappointed in himself, though. He'd come up with a few not so bad ideas about what to say to be supportive, but for the life of him he couldn't remember anything. Carol leaning against him, shaking and squeezing him, wiped out everything that he'd come up with.

Daryl was a little annoyed at the nurse. She'd said that Carol was fine and this didn't exactly seem fine to him. He felt like that was one of the problems with medical people. Either you were dead or you were fine and they seemed to forget that there were a whole lot of other things that fell between the two extremes.

"It's fine," Daryl repeated.

Carol was calming down a little now, though he felt an occasional gentle tremor run through her. She pulled away from him, wiping at her eyes a little and he assumed she may have been crying.

"Ya better? Ya need ta get dressed," Daryl said. He figured if he could get her dressed then he could take her to the house and she could do all the crying that she wanted to do there. He also had the option when she was there of calling Michonne if things got bad and he needed some backup in figuring out what to do to fix it.

"It's OK," Carol said.

Daryl nodded.

"Ya right, it's OK," Daryl said. He looked around trying to find her clothes and finally found everything she had come in with piled on a chair. He picked it up and closed the room to the door, circling around and bringing it to her.

"No," Carol said. "It's OK…it's OK."

Daryl decided that a side of insanity might go along with whatever Carol was going through.

"It's OK," he repeated. "Get'cha clothes on an' we goin' home."

Carol's eyes widened a little and she nodded at him, finally making some move to start putting on her clothes.

"The baby, Daryl," Carol said. "It's OK."

Daryl knitted his eyebrows.

"It's OK?" He asked.

She nodded. Then was the first time that she smiled, though her eyes were still wide like they'd been earlier. She slipped off the table, pulling on her clothes and he stood close to her since she seemed a little shaky and he didn't want her busting her head open or something…though they were in the best place they could be if she did decide to bust her head open.

"Wasn't that what ya wanted?" Daryl asked. Carol was pulling on her bra now. "Why ya upset?"

"I don't know…" Carol said. "I mean yes that's what I want…but I just couldn't stop myself. I just don't know…I wasn't expecting it."

Daryl was glad that the baby was fine and that's what Carol wanted, but he had no idea why it was that she'd been shaking like she was, and still seemed a little shaky, if the answer the doctor had given her was the one that she'd been hoping for. He decided this was maybe one of the things that Hershel had talked about, though. It was one of those things that he was better off not trying to understand because maybe she didn't understand it either.

"Ain't no need ta be upset now," Daryl said. "Ya fine, it's fine, an' we goin' home."

Daryl waited until Carol was dressed. She looked around awkwardly for a moment and he didn't know what she was looking for until she started across the room. He followed after her and she got her purse off the chair, pulling it onto her shoulder. Daryl wrapped his arm around her, still not entirely sure that she was stable enough to really be standing and walking around on her own, and they started down through the labyrinth together with Daryl supporting her slightly, his arm around her back, and her guiding them both through the halls.

They ran into the smiling nurse from earlier and she stopped them, putting her hand on Carol's arm.

"Feeling better?" She asked.

Carol nodded.

"I'm sorry," Carol said, shaking her head.

The woman smiled. Daryl read that her name was Constance. He decided he'd remember her name because so far she was his favorite of the nurses simply because she smiled a lot more than anyone else in the building.

"It's OK," Constance said. "Believe me, we see everything. You're not the first woman I've seen get upset, and you won't be the last. The baby's fine, though, and now you just need to relax. Go home, get something to eat, get some rest, and congratulations."

Carol smiled and thanked Constance and Daryl nodded at her. He waited a moment while she squeezed Carol's arm again and then walked in the opposite direction.

Daryl led Carol to the front desk and waited while she filled out some things. The woman behind the desk flipped through a folder and handed Carol a few things and then Daryl walked her out to the truck and helped her in.

Daryl wasn't really sure what he was supposed to say. He supposed that he should say that he was happy about the baby, but the reality was that he couldn't honestly say that. He wasn't happy about it and he wasn't unhappy about it. He was indifferent to the whole idea more than anything. He was relieved that, for Carol's sake, everything was fine, but he was fairly certain that wasn't what he should say either.

"How ya feelin'?" Daryl asked, glancing over to the passenger side of the truck where Carol was sitting, looking through the folder. He could see at a glance she had another one of the pictures that he couldn't tell a thing about.

"I'm…I'm fine," Carol said.

"Hungry?" Daryl asked. He wondered if Carol might be more interested in food now that she wasn't worried so much.

"Yeah," Carol said. She was still fumbling through the things in the folder that she had. Daryl didn't think that there was much in there, but he wasn't going to tell her that she couldn't flip through it as many times at she pleased.

"Wanna go ta Lula's?" Daryl asked. He knew there were a few other eating establishments in Sweet Junction, including the place that Andrea worked at, but he knew that Lula's was best if you weren't sure what you might want.

"I think I'd rather just eat something at home," Carol said. "If that's alright with you."

"Fine with me," Daryl said. He wasn't rocking the boat at all. If she wanted to eat sandwiches at the house, there was absolutely no problem there. She'd finally calmed down and that was about all he needed her to do right this minute.

"I'm really tired," Carol said suddenly, closing her folder and leaning back in the seat. Daryl chuckled a little.

"After ya eat somethin' we could take a nap," he offered. "I didn't sleep a whole bunch neither last night."

He glanced over and Carol smiled at him.

"I'd like that," she said.

At the house Daryl offered to make sandwiches. Carol wouldn't give in, though, so he finally agreed to her suggestion that they make them together. He noticed that she stuck the picture from the day to the corkboard on the side of the refrigerator, the same place they'd tacked up the phone numbers that they regularly needed.

They sat down and ate, but there wasn't much conversation between them. Daryl was feeling exhausted, and from the looks of her, Carol wasn't exactly hanging onto a waking state by much. While Carol wiped down the dishes from lunch, Daryl took Lincoln out, and then he followed her to the bedroom in hopes of the nap they both needed desperately. Carol almost collapsed into bed, stripping out of her clothes as she went until nothing but her shirt and underwear remained. Not interested in guarding any decorum himself, Daryl stripped to his underwear and crawled in bed beside her. It didn't matter to either one of them that it wasn't exactly a normal hour to collapse into bed.

As Daryl lie there, Carol eased over to him as though she might lie against him. She looked at him a little strange, almost as if asking permission, and he smiled, scooting himself toward her and opening his arms in her direction. She smiled and slid next to him wrapping her arms around him and throwing one leg over his, trapping him in a giant hug.

Daryl was willing to ignore the fact that it wasn't the most comfortable position in the world. Just having her there, pressed against him, was enough to make up for the discomfort. She snuggled into him, kissing his chest. Obviously already well on her way to falling asleep.

"So everything's OK, huh?" Daryl asked, keeping his voice low. Carol snuggled against him a little more, rooting into him.

"Yeah," she said, her voice already sounding sleepy. "Baby's OK."

"An' how you feel?" He asked.

"Sleepy," Carol replied. "But happy."

Daryl smiled to himself, pulling her just a little tighter. He kissed the top of her head, smelling her shampoo and the scent of whatever perfume it was that she put on before they left that morning. He loved the smell of her. Whether it was right out of the shower or when she complained of smelling bad after work, he thought she always smelled good. She smelled comfortable to him.

"How do you feel about it," Carol asked.

Daryl thought about it for a moment. From what Hershel had told him, he didn't think his somewhat indifferent feeling was a bad thing. It just meant that he hadn't found the place that Hershel said he would get to. Eventually he'd love the kid, he just wasn't there yet. He had the feeling, though, that Carol might not like it too much if he said that, so he decided to just fib his way through it a little…just until the feeling did come.

"I'm happy," he said. It wasn't a lie. He was happy. He was happy that she was happy and that she wasn't worrying like she had been. He was also very happy that she was snuggling against him right now instead of making him wonder if she was ever going to forgive him enough to let him really touch her again. He felt like, in saying he was happy, he hadn't lied at all. He just didn't need to explain to her that for him whether or not the baby was OK hadn't meant all that much to him…not as far as the baby was concerned…it had only really been important to him because of how much it meant to her.

"Are you sure?" Carol asked. "You're really happy?"

Daryl smiled to himself and kissed the top of her head again, breathing in her scent. He sighed a little, feeling like sleep wouldn't be too far away.

"I'm sure," he said. "I'm happy."

Carol sighed.

"Get some sleep, OK?" Daryl said. "I reckon a nap'd do us both good."

"Mmm…" Carol hummed. "Maybe all three of us," she said.

Daryl lie there a moment.

"Hm…" he responded. "Reckon ya might be right…all three of us," he said. It was a strange concept, and one that he knew he still had to think about for a while, but Daryl had to admit that he didn't entirely hate the sound of that.

He yawned and closed his eyes, trying to focus more on the fact that Carol was already starting to breathe steadily, pressed against him, and less on the fact that his arm would probably be asleep before long. He knew he'd rather tolerate the numbness than ask her to move. He'd rather tolerate a lot, in that moment, than ask her to move.