Chapter Six
He stood there in the middle of the bedroom, trying to wrap his head around everything that had just happened. He was worried about his brother, he was worried about himself, his mind couldn't even process the fact that this woman was Carol. The same soft and sweet person he had left safe behind the walls of the prison.
The rain started up again, pounding against the dirty window but it felt like it was pounding against the inside of his skull. He looked up when she came back into the room. He watched closely, noticing differences in how she moved now, how her eyes scanned the small space despite the fact that they had made sure the apartment was clear. When she looked up she met his eyes levelly, not ducking her head shyly or offering up that sly smile.
"Take off your shirt," she said, her tone brusque, no nonsense.
He knew he needed to listen to her but there was something about her tone that squirmed under his skin, causing him to narrow his eyes. "You gonna explain what the hell is going on?" He asked. "Why are you out here with these people?"
She huffed and then her fingers were boldly working the buttons of his shirt open. He let her, knowing he was injured, knowing he wasn't in the position to put up a fight. "Rick thought that the group would be safer if I wasn't a part of it. He drove me to a subdivision and he dropped me off. I was on my own for a while and then I ran into other women."
Daryl wasn't sure how much more he could take. Nothing she said made any sense. Her being here right now didn't make any sense. Rick wouldn't have done what she was accusing him of. "Rick never would have done that," he said just as she shoved his shirt off.
She smiled but it was cold. "I need you to lay down."
"I need you to tell me how the hell any of this happened!" He barked, losing patience with her.
She looked up sharply. "And I need you to let me take care of this. Please."
He sat down, wincing at the pain that he had nearly forgot about. She pushed him gently her eyes on his injured side. He stretched out and let her take a look. He'd already guessed that it was nothing. The knife had went in a few inches away from the bolt scar, hitting the fleshy part of his side. It was still bleeding but it wasn't life threatening. The only thing he was worried about was infection.
"This is..." Her voice trailed off and he came up on his elbows, looking down in time to see her finger trace the small scar left from a time he had been so sure he'd find her daughter for her. For a few seconds her eyes softened until they became familiar again, her teeth dragging across her bottom lip as her gaze lingered on that scar. Suddenly she was the woman that had spent the last year and half haunting him. "Why did you have to leave?" She whispered, her voice breaking slightly.
He let out a slow breath but before he could answer her question her eyes came up, settling on his and taking on that edge once more. That cool facade slammed back into place and she schooled her features quickly, almost hurriedly.
She cleared her throat and waved her hand at him, like she was dismissing a child. "Never mind. This is gonna sting," she said and then he hissed as she poured alcohol right onto the cut, and then the sadistic woman actually worked the wound so more would get inside.
"Jesus," he growled, squirming.
"We have to keep it from getting infected," she said, wiping away the blood and alcohol. "You'll live."
His teeth slammed together and he silently endured the torture. He was glad that it was only a flesh wound but damn if it wasn't starting to feel like his whole side was on fire. He hadn't had to endure much of this part when his side had been injured that first time because Andrea had shot him in the damn head and he wasn't conscious for the worst of it.
"Now your arm," she said grabbing his hand and urging him up and getting right to work on the bullet graze. Keeping her eyes on her work she asked, "What were you and your brother planning on doing with the girl you had when I showed up?"
Daryl scowled. "What the hell is that suppose to mean?" Was she accusing him of something?
She shrugged. "Merle looked like he was ready to rough her up."
Daryl shook his head. "She shot at us. He was getting the goddamn gun from her. What? You think we were gonna hurt her?"
She met his eyes. "I don't know. I didn't know it was you. And even if I had known it was you, I don't really know you anymore now do I? You don't seem to be the same man that I knew and I know that I'm nothing like the woman you knew so, were you? Gonna hurt her?"
"No, I wasn't. Neither was my brother. Now will you tell me what happened to you? Why Rick would turn you out like that."
"There was some sort of virus sweeping the prison. A lot of the people from Woodbury were with us by then. I thought... I thought if I got rid of the carriers, that the virus wouldn't spread to the others. I killed a man and a woman, dragged them out and set their bodies on fire."
He felt like the floor had opened up and he was sliding down a dark hole. He shook his head. "You couldn't have done that," he said, wondering what the hell could have happened at that prison after he left.
"I did it because I was afraid that the children would get sick. Anyway, I confessed and Rick got rid of me. He said that I was cold and he couldn't have me around his children," she shrugged. "I wasn't necessarily surprised by what he did. Believe it or not, I don't really put too much faith in anyone at all anymore."
He stared at her as she worked on the cut on his arm but her eyes stayed hard, focused. He tried to understand. He wanted to. He'd killed too, since he'd been gone. "You were tryin' to save the group. You thought you were doing the right thing at least. Even if it didn't work."
She looked at him then and for a brief moment she smiled. It was a small sad smile and very brief but there all the same and he took it as a good sign. "You're all finished. You lost a lot of blood and there isn't anything we can do right now. Get some rest." She turned to walk out of the room, like he'd actually be able to rest at all knowing his brother was out there somewhere, possibly dead. He grabbed her wrist, stopping her. She glanced down at him.
He motioned towards the blood that had soaked through her own shirt. "Your turn," he said gruffly, not wanting her to leave just yet. Hoping that he'd get another glimpse of the woman that he'd missed for a long time now.
She looked down and arched a brow. "I didn't realize I'd even gotten hurt."
He shrugged and grabbed the bottle of alcohol she'd left sitting on the bed beside him. He stayed there on the edge of the bed. "I got your back the worst I think."
She nodded and then turned, shedding the hooded jacket she was still wearing and tossing it to the side. His eyes widened when she stripped the shirt off without a care in the world. Her back was to him so it wasn't like he had a view of anything other than the line of her spine but it still had a strangely embarrassing effect on him.
His eyes zeroed in on the long jagged gash and it sobered him a bit. He went to work cleaning it up, clearing his throat loudly. "So, how exactly did you end up becoming some sort of hard ass?" He asked, just to make conversation. "Sure as hell put up a fight down there."
She glanced over her shoulder and he looked up in time to see another one of those fleeting smiles. Her shoulder lifted lightly in a shrug. "It was just one of those situations where you act without thinking. I'm not a hard ass. I wanted to live and I thought you were going to kill me."
"I wouldn't have killed you," he mumbled, turning her slightly so he could keep cleaning the wound. It curved around her side. She kept one arm crossed over her chest. "This was my last run. I came with them to the city just so I could have somebody at my back. I was leaving the group and coming back to the prison."
She was quiet while he bandaged the cut and then he stood up. With her back to him she walked to the closet, sifting through some clothes until she pulled out a suitable shirt and slipped it on before she turned. "Why?"
"Why what?" He asked, even though he knew what she meant. He'd told himself that if he ever saw her again that he'd be honest with her. He wouldn't beat around the bush. But that was when he thought he was coming back to the same person. He felt like he didn't even know this woman, so what should he say? He shrugged. "I thought I'd be able to stay gone. I thought, with Merle, I'd be able to just do what I'd always done. I was wrong."
She nodded. "I'm not sure what you'll find. I haven't been back. I'm not begging anyone, especially Rick, to let me back in. I don't need him to survive. I've done just fine out here."
He looked up sharply. He hadn't expected her to go back after she'd told him what Rick had done, but to know that she wouldn't even consider it, considering trying if he was with her, well, it stung a little. Were they really that far gone that after seeing one another after a year and a half she'd just watch him walk off without batting an eye? He had known that him leaving had probably hurt her but he was starting to wonder if that was true. "Maybe if we both-"
"Rick made it clear I wasn't welcome," she said stiffly, clearly not wanting to talk about it.
"That's Rick's problem right goddamn there," he snapped, the anger pouring over him in a rush, unexpected and unwelcome. "He's a fuckin' head case. He's been a head case since he lost Lori. Him struttin' around barkin' orders even though he was half out of his goddamn mind, like he was the only person that's ever lost somebody. That was your home. Those people were your family and it ain't right that you would give it all up without a fight." He needed her to understand that she could have it all again. And even if she couldn't have the prison, or the group, back... she could have him if she'd knock down this impenetrable wall she had built. Right now she was more closed off than he had ever been.
"I don't think you understand, Daryl," she said, her voice soft. "I don't need the prison and I don't need those people. My family was Sophia and Sophia is dead. The group at the prison were just people. People I was trying to survive with. Do you think Rick was the only one that thought I was a danger? You know he had people backing his decision."
Daryl shook his head. "That ain't true."
She shrugged. "You keep telling yourself that. But family doesn't abandon family and family doesn't just throw you away like you're nothing. I'm alone and I'm okay with that. You should be okay with it too. Don't you dare feel sorry for me. I actually owe you."
"Owe me?" He asked, frowning.
She nodded. "You taught me that people leave, even when you hope like hell you're worth staying for. They'll leave and they'll do for themselves before they'll ever do for you. Believe it or not, Rick Grimes was far from my greatest disappointment, Daryl." She stepped around him then, closing the door to the bedroom without a backwards glance.
He shook his head and ran a hand over his face. A memory came to the forefront of his mind. The memory of the woman he'd met at the quarry. Her spirit broken, her feelings smashed by a son of a bitch that, at one time, had claimed to care about her. The woman on the farm, the way she'd flinched from his words the night she'd came to him after her daughter was found in the barn. The woman at the prison that had seemed full of hope and promise, the sly teasing she'd rib him with every so often.
Her spirit wasn't damaged. He'd seen that down there in the street when she had fought so hard to survive. But her heart? Yeah, that had taken hit after hit and just from those parting words, he was almost sure that he'd broken it worse than he'd thought when he left the prison. Maybe she didn't really see the injustice in what Rick had done because she had expected him to do something like that. And maybe she expected it because Daryl really had let her down that much.
He wasn't sure if he had much of a chance to make amends with her. She seemed hardened and unwilling to even give him even an inch. Maybe that just meant that he had to fight a little harder.